


Runes and all kinds of things

by FeelingsDusk



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: BAMF!Stiles, M/M, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Mentions of alcoholism, Phonefic, UA, bamf!allison
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-18
Updated: 2017-10-04
Packaged: 2018-05-21 11:24:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 58,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6049870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FeelingsDusk/pseuds/FeelingsDusk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Enough is enough.  Stiles is tired of being always a last choice when he always tries to do his best for his precious people, so they better get their act together or face being left behind.</p><p>OR</p><p>The things in the Argent's basement get nearly fatal, the Sheriff finds about the supernatural, Allison can have a wicked, wicked mind and Peter Hale appears to be everywhere.</p><p>Oh, and Stiles can't seem to stop breaking the laws of physics with his magic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [tomorrow is another day](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4288575) by [cywscross](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cywscross/pseuds/cywscross). 



> First Teen Wolf fic :) This is loosely inspired by cywscross' tomorrow is another day (well, anything she writes to be honest) because the magic and the Stallison!bro feelings in it were epic.
> 
> This is a phonefic, so the chapters won't be very long. Sorry about that!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*

Prologue.

Stiles is seriously pissed off.

That he can find the strength to be angry right now should be surprising but, sadly, it isn't. After all it has been an almost constant state of mind for a while and by now it comes as easy as breathing. To be honest, he can’t actually remember the last day he wasn’t pissed off or angry or hurt or afraid or any given combination of all of the above. However, today is special, it seems, because he’s all of those at the same time and if Scott doesn’t stop talking in the next three seconds he’s not going to be responsible for his actions. Because enough is enough and it has been enough for at least half a year already and if that doesn’t say anything about Stiles’ endurance and loyalty…

Seeing Stiles like this seems to have finally shaken Allison out of that terrible cold rage that had blinded her after her mom died. She's pale faced and looking at Scott as if she’s seeing him for the very first time, incredulous about what's coming out of his mouth. For a second Stiles feels a pang of regret and he squashes it as fast as he can. No, he’s not the one in the wrong here; he’s not going to be looking after Scott’s love life right now, not when he’s bleeding out on the Argent’s previously pristine kitchen floor with Allison pressing on his gunshot wound a pale pink rag that Stiles can't seem to be able to stop fixating on.

Not when he can hear the ambulance fast approaching, not when his father’s cruiser is swerving on the asphalt not so far from them, not when his _anxiouspanickyterrified_ “STILES?!” reaches his ears and he wants to cringe at the tone of his voice because this is going to kill him and his dad barely survived his mom's death and it took him years to be even functional and...

Not right now when his vision is blackening at the edges.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please review :) and let me know what you think.
> 
> Thanks [@nineorfour](https://tmblr.co/mukyLNts2OHZG9R4qM1ik0g) for proofing this.


	2. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*
> 
> Thanks [@nineorfour](https://tmblr.co/mukyLNts2OHZG9R4qM1ik0g) for proofing this.

Chapter 1

It's a sound that penetrates the fog first. At first it comes as if from afar, muffled and without a discernible pattern, then the sound gradually develops into a constant beep and it's volume grows until it becomes an annoyance that forces him to make the effort to pry his eyelids open to localize its source.

Waking up to the discovery of an E.T. tube inside his throat is not a situation Stiles is eager to experience ever again. Period. He thinks the only reason he doesn't start gagging and choking on it immediately is that the action requires an energy that he can't spare right now because he needs it to keep himself awake... Or another valid explanation would be that he’s doped to his ears, since his vision is fuzzy around the edges (or everywhere really) and he knows that’s not normal by any means.

He absently identifies the source of the constant beep as an electrocardiograph that he wishes would stop because it feels as if each beep is steadily rising in volume towards perforating his eardrums, but the machine is too far away to reach it and he can't muster the will to raise his arm anyway. Speaking of said arm, there's an I.V. drip tube connected to it if the bags he's spotted are any indication, and he _really_ doesn’t want to look where it's hooked into his arm. He hates needles even more than he hates hospitals and that's saying something, because every time he has to step into one (and especially anywhere near the psychiatric ward), he feels the anxiety building inside him slowly but steadily, until he thinks he won't be able to breathe.

It's really, _really_ , good that he's stoned right now, or an anxiety attack would be rearing its ugly head at the thought of being stuck here with, by the looks of it, no possibility of leaving any time soon.

Something twitches in his hand, averting his line of thought. There’s a hand grasping his loosely and it takes a titanic effort to will his eyes to look in that direction. His heart constricts at the sight of his father’s haggard appearance, all worry lines and sunken eyes with a dark purple under them that speaks of many sleepless nights. His hair looks a little bit matted too and his clothes rumpled even if mostly clean. There's a little coffee stain on his dad's left breast and a plastic cup is halfway squeezed in the hand that isn't grasping Stiles'. How many days have passed?

Try as he might, he can’t even begin to guess... and to be honest, he doesn't give a damn right now. He's alive, his dad's alive, and Gerard is not. That's all he cares about right now.

He's not in denial or in shock. He remembers the second of stupefaction right after being shot, then feeling nothing as he fought for the gun, then the jarring surge of white-hot pain after shooting Gerard and after everything (including, as he guesses now, his adrenaline) came crashing down. He remembers the dark satisfaction of seeing Gerard's wide unseeing eyes and his prone body as a pool of blood formed fascinatingly quick under the old man's head. He remembers that the tiles had felt incredibly cold when he fell after his legs couldn't stand his own weight anymore, but also how they had warmed up barely a moment after. He remembers laying on the Argent's kitchen floor with Allison pressing on his wound with that pale pink rag that was turning red stupidly fast and he couldn't stop looking at it for some reason he can't understand now, his own pool of blood growing significantly slower than Gerard's but steadily so. He remembers so many things of those traumatizing moments, so many crystal clear details, but he just doesn't care about anything of that right now.

And that’s a good thing because if he starts to dwell on the things that have happened on the last few days he may entertain the idea of killing Scott… Well, maybe not _that_... if only for the sake of old times.

His dad must have felt him stir because he wakes up with a start, almost choking with the sharp intake of air he takes in relief when he sees his son awake and cognizant. Has Stiles woken up before and he doesn't remember it? John squeezes his hand and Stiles tries to squeeze back when he notices the small tremor that makes his dad's free hand shake when he reaches to pull his own fringe back before letting it rest on Stiles' forehead. The sight makes his stomach clench. Nothing can make this moment worse.

“Werewolves, Stiles?”

He starts choking with the E.T. tube almost instantly and the next thing he knows nurses are rushing in to pull it out, though it seems that they debate putting him under again for precious moments in which Stiles just _hates_ everything.

 _He’s going to kill Scott_.

Afterwards, he gives his father the truth he wants. Part of him is relieved at finally being able to do so, to be open about everything and not having to spew more lies and defections than actual words. The other part of him, the one that has endured for the sake of keeping his only remaining family safe, is terrified to the core of the consequences this will bring.

——–

So it seems to more or less have gone like the following, and excuse him if he's not in the mood to feel charitable or understanding about the whole thing at the moment.

Apparently while Stiles had been busy busting his ass with Scott’s control issues, being traumatized by having to watch the kanima kill somebody, saving a very vocally ungrateful Derek from drowning while said kanima tried to kill them, helping keep Scott’s grades at least on a passing level apart from not letting his own drop and dealing with his father’s distrustfulness and disappointment; Scott had gone behind his back to make a deal with the devil himself for whatever reasons he had thought to justify his betrayal (maybe getting back on Allison’s good graces or finding a cure, who knows?) at the moment, if he even thought about the whole situation in those terms, the self-centered oblivious little shit. But, moving on, if he understood Scott's ramblings well (and there's a possibility of him misinterpreting them, he was, after all, losing a lot of blood and going into shock), he had a plan that involved using Derek or something like that? And a failsafe in case everything else failed?

Obviously it hadn't worked, whatever the plan was. Gerard, of course, had decades on Scott (and to be honest Scott isn’t the sharpest tool in the box to begin with, even when the Allison factor isn't fogging his brain up) and when the moment of truth had come and Derek had been a no-show (probably because he had suspected something was fishy), he had turned the tables on him so fast that Scott had to hightail to avoid being cut in two.

Literally.

(Case in point: Laura.)

Afterwards, while Scott was panicking and thinking of a way to salvage the situation, Gerard had crept back to his basement like a bad Disney villain to continue having his fun with Stiles and to try to _convince_ him to lure Derek to him (which still blows his mind, because he has made his dislike of their pack pretty clear even if he's stupid and grudgingly continues to help), only to find out that Stiles had been a busy little bee and had let Erica and Boyd out of their bindings. Both had tried to help but had ended up leaving Stiles to face the music alone (thanks a lot, dynamic duo, may you get fleas and stomach worms for that) and in the middle of the scuffle with grandpa, Allison herself had appeared. Of course, that was after listening in, hidden in some dark cranny, to the mandatory villain speech where the man had quite stupidly revealed all his secrets. She was understandably shocked about what was revealed (especially the part about her mom), but thankfully it changed her mind and she was therefore opposed to the idea of killing slash harming Stiles, which, awesome, less problems for him.

More fighting plus more yelling plus more guns plus china breaking plus a stupid stunt to help Allison equals a nearly dying Stiles and splattered walls that will need to be repainted. He really doesn't envy Mr. Argent the task of cleaning his own father's brains and probably some pieces of the cranium too from the adjacent cupboards. Or all that blood either, because Stiles bets that getting it from in between the tiles is going to be a bitch.

(He might be acting and feeling entirely too flippant about the whole thing, but the alternative leads to a much darker path that he'd prefer to avoid, thank you very much.)

Anyways, the icing on the cake that was already a shitshow was Scott appearing after Stiles had blown Gerard brains out (with his own gun, oh, the irony, so satisfying) with a _what are you doing here?!_ followed by a _what have you done?!_ after seeing Gerard’s body. Never mind that Stiles had a hole of his own in his stomach, apparently that wasn’t noteworthy? Ironies of all ironies, Allison had been the one that had finally shaken herself out of shock and remembered to call for an ambulance while Scott, after _finally_ realizing the state he was in, had a stress induced panic attack.

Seriously, the irony, he can't stress that enough.

Derek was nowhere to be seen, Erica and Boyd were gone, Scott was having technical difficulties and Allison, try as she might (and hell, _was_ she trying, Stiles will give her that), knew nothing of first aid, so Stiles was sure his future, if there was any, was very dark and was trying not to think that things couldn’t be worst than they already were to avoid jinxing it. So who chose to slink from the shadows at that same exact moment?

Peter.

Fuck his life.

Peter had effectively shut off Scott (by rendering him unconscious, which, yeah, he has to admit that seeing him drop like a sack of potatoes was extremely satisfying and a relief to his ears at the moment) plus snarked Allison down into some sort of compromise before Stiles could even blink, and then proceeded to sassily keep him alive long enough for his father and the ambulance to arrive.

Fuck it twice.

And before almost theatrically crawling back to the shadows from whence he came (conveniently before his father’s appearance and Scott’s return to the land of the awakened) he had proceeded to declare Stiles in his debt in the most roundabout way he could possibly find.

Where was a Molotov cocktail when you needed it?

To date, he still doesn’t know what happened with Jackson. So long as he doesn’t give them any more trouble, he doesn’t care.

—–

They get interrupted by the staff's visit, which is almost a relief for Stiles, because his throat is smarting a bit and the ice chips are only helping so much.

Stiles' main doctor is a partially white-haired blond man with a wrinkled face whose warm features and even warmer voice make him instantly comfortable, which is inexplicably surprising for him given his overall stance on hospitals and doctors. It may be helping that the man doesn't treat him like a kid or tries to keep things from him (that Stiles can tell anyway) when he explains what's going to happen in the near future and in the long run regarding his injury.

Apparently he’s been very lucky. When he struggled with Gerard he must have altered the path of the shot the man was trying to make or something because no major organs were punctured. His stomach was dangerously close to being ruptured but thankfully it wasn't, or he would have died before any help could arrive. The bullet tore only fat and muscle but since he had continued struggling for control of the gun afterwards, he had aggravated it significantly. It had been a point-blank shot that had gone through and through (apparently his dad had recovered the bullet on the Argent's stove) and it had left a stippling tattoo apart from burning him. All in all, the highest risk would had been the blood loss and the infection, except he went into shock and wouldn't stop thrashing by the time he had arrived at the hospital. He had to be sedated and then intubated when he stopped breathing. The E.T. tube had been scheduled to be taken out today regardless of whether he woke or not, because he seemed to be breathing well on his own. They'll be monitoring that just in case and Stiles is instructed to call the nurses if he has any trouble breathing again.

When the doctor leaves, they remain silent for a bit, mulling over all the information. Stiles’ father clears his throat a couple of times before telling him in no uncertain terms (hands, no, everything still trembling because the thought of having nearly lost Stiles too makes him feel sick, terrifies him) that the one that has to do the protecting there is him and after giving him a hug that nearly hurts, he also wastes no time in giving him a month’s worth of punishment for the lying and the going behind his back. Stiles doesn’t bother arguing because it will get him nowhere and because he’s too exhausted to make any good points. Never mind that they both know that Stiles wouldn't be able to go out with his injury anyway, so this punishment is as fake as they make it, a token one. His father frowns at that, because normally Stiles would argue against it anyway, just for the sake of it. John sighs and kisses him on the forehead, like he used to do before everything started going to hell, the sickness and his mom’s death and the alcohol and the long working hours and suddenly everything crashes on Stiles and he has to bite his lip to avoid babbling like a baby.

Of course Scott chooses that moment to appear at the door and to announce himself with an uncomfortable clearing of his throat.

Stiles promptly tells him to leave and not come back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please review :) and let me know what you think.


	3. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*
> 
> Thanks [@nineorfour](https://tmblr.co/mukyLNts2OHZG9R4qM1ik0g) for proofing this.

Chapter 2

Stiles is exhausted, which is really messed up because he's been doing nothing but sleep for the past few days. Normally he would be climbing the walls in frustration by now, but to do that he has to actually manage to stay awake consistently, and he just can't. He's awake one instant and the next thing he knows he's peeling his eyes open ten minutes slash two hours later. To make matters worse, while his mind is a little foggy due to all the pain medication they're feeding him through the I.V. tube, when he's properly awake, it's jumping from one place to another too fast to keep track because he can't have his Adderall. Again, this is really frustrating because Stiles just wants to hide his head in the sand and avoid the Scott issue for a while but his mind won't let him. He's even started learning Spanish through the novelas on the TV (and, boy, wasn't his dad's face priceless when the man saw him doing exactly that, muttering an _oh, Marco Enrique, no me dejes_ in a tone half dramatic, half drowsy, one hand feebly in the air and the other clutching his heart) but to no avail.

If he’s completely honest with himself, part of him wants to forgive Scott for everything and go back to the status quo because being at odds with him right now (anyone, really) is exhausting and well beyond his current capabilities. Whenever that thought comes by, though, he reminds himself of all the shit that has happened lately. He forces himself to remember how ever since Scott got bitten and a position on the team and the girl and popularity and _options_ , Stiles has gradually come to be redundant, a last resort for when everything else fails but also so taken for granted that it's insulting and demeaning. And that’s not okay because for Stiles up until now Scott was on _The List_ , with his father, Lydia and before her death, his mom.

His always first choices, always loyal to, for whom he would sacrifice _anything_ and _everything_.

And doesn’t that list say anything about him? Because there hasn’t been an equal exchange between Stiles and the people on it for a while now… if ever. It hurts to think about it without lying to himself about how Lydia would always choose Jackson, Scott his mom and Allison, and his father, for quite a while, the liquor and his job over him. And he doesn’t even want to _think about thinking_ about his mom’s last year. That way leads to madness.

(Why? Why can't he be anyone's first choice? If he's able to have more than one important person and care for them all, why do others seem to be incapable of doing the same? Or is it just about Stiles? What is it about him that makes him-?)

He stops himself ruthlessly from going down that road and forces himself to focus on the positive side. It takes him a bit, but he finally focusses on remembering how it used to be way worse and on how his father seems to have gotten his shit together over the years and now he’s at worst a highly functional alcoholic and a workaholic; On how maybe, _just maybe_ , this thing about his dad being in the know isn’t that bad and Stiles can finally stop lying on nearly every conversation they have; Also, macabre or not, on how Gerard’s brain matter splattering on the wall means that the man won’t be able to ever touch him again. Some would actually _beg_ for a reassurance like that and Stiles made it happen with his own two hands. Even hurt and debilitated, he did it.

_The puny and weak human came out on top and beat the odds!_

_Isn't that exhilarating?_

He clenches his fists and takes a deep breath, holding it for a few seconds before letting it go. Then he shakes his head trying to clear it and immediately groans dizzily. Damn the medication. He hates having to take it because it muddles his mind and normally (like in this case) he has to stop with the Adderall while being treated, which he hates even more than having to take the Adderall in the first place.

His mind right now is _again_ in that state when it is a little lethargic and sluggish but at the same time trying to be all over the place, which he blames for the impromptu deep thoughts that he normally tends to avoid… and for not noticing when Allison has somehow made herself at home on one of the uncomfortable chairs beside his hospital bed, where she seems to be waiting for him to acknowledge her with her bag still in her lap, as if she's waiting for Stiles to decide whether he will allow her to remain or not.

Stiles blinks and tries to make his brain reboot because the situation does not compute. What is she doing here? Don’t get him wrong, he is grateful that she got her shit together in time to help keep him alive, but they aren’t friends, never have been. At best, they have been positive acquaintances for the sake of Scott and nothing more, and that was before her descent to the dark pit that is rage and helplessness and the quest for revenge, when it was her against everything and everyone, and God help whoever got in her path. And don't get him wrong, Stiles gets it, he really does. He probably would have done the same when his mom died if there hadn't been other things more pressing to care about. But understanding doesn't mean he wouldn't have put a bullet in her too if she had gotten in the way of his own or his loved ones' survival.

“I talked with Derek Hale,” she breaks the silence finally, after a few minutes of bearing Stiles' suspicious scrutiny with admirable grace. Even when his dark thoughts probably showed in his face.

“With? You actually got him to talk back?” he snorts skeptically, eyes a little narrowed and brows high. He isn’t proud of the almost drugged slur in his voice but his response earns him a twitch of her lips. “Impressive. Didn’t think he was actually capable of any type of conversation… besides eyebrow signing or drum communication.“

“Drums," she states flatly, but her lips twitch again. The grip she has on her bag has relaxed minutely, but she at least knows how Stiles operates because she hasn't made any move to make herself more comfortable on the chair and she's still sitting on the very edge.

“Without actual drums, you know? Like, with people? Yeah, he does that a lot. Being slammed into the wheel of my Roscoe wasn’t fun, I tell you.“ He pauses, considering it carefully and then hums as if enlightened. “But it got the message across real quick, I’ll give him that,” he finishes blithely, his smile with a nasty sharp edge that doesn't escape her notice.

“Well, there were a lot of glowers and threats… and growls and flashes of red eyes… Lots of posturing, really,” she says loftily and with enough nonchalance to make him wonder how she got him to stay put and avoided getting attacked (ah, to be a fly on that wall), before she sobers, all traces of humor gone from her face and voice. “He told me what happened. He... explained everything that he did... And that she did.”

He doesn’t answer beyond a noncommittal sound but he doesn’t have to. She isn’t stupid, after all, no matter how she is undoubtedly feeling because she let herself be manipulated, first by her aunt and then Gerard. Also his blank face right now probably says it all, because something along the lines of _was it that difficult to ask and listen?_ is clearly depicted on it despite the lack of facial expression. He doesn’t say anything because even he knows that yes, it is that difficult, because something like what happened can mess with a person’s mind, and that’s without outside interference added on top of it. May Gerard's soul (if he actually had one of those) be in the darkest, deepest pit of hell right now being sodomized by the Devil's pointy tail.

On the TV Lucía Paola is breaking the news to Pablo Antonio (who has cancer and doesn't know it yet, but will soon because the doctor has just received the result of the tests and is about to call him) about being pregnant but she's keeping to herself, as her internal monologue tells, that the baby is in reality Marco Enrique's (dramatic music ensues), with whom she's planning to elope (more dramatic music) as soon as night comes because Pablo Antonio is a beast that doesn't treat her right. She was forced to marry him by her mother, Mariana Estrella, whom is watching with narrowed eyes from outside the room, through the cracked door. The woman is pursing her lips dangerously as her internal monologue reveals that she knows that the baby isn't Pablo Antonio's (even more dramatic music) with a derisive and downright mean voice. After that revelation, she's now looking dangerously through the window, and Marco Enrique is seen tending to the horses and laughing with another man about how mares have to be treated with gentle hands.

"¡Oh, no, Marco Enrique, cuidado!" Stiles mutters softly, voice purposely a little high, as the silence drags, earning himself an incredulous look from Allison that he studiously ignores as he inserts more dramatic music and a thunderous clap for good measure. "¡La mamá va a intentar acabar contigo seguro! ¡Y Lucía Paola no dejará a Pablo Antonio si sabe que tiene cancer!"

So he stays silent about the matter because he understands, even if it’s very frustrating to think that a lot of problems could have been avoided that easily. Also, it’s not like her actions were a betrayal to him, because, well… positive acquaintances, duh. Where Stiles is concerned, to betray him you have to have his trust in the first place and Allison didn't. Scott did, and he betrayed Stiles by going behind his back and actively lying to him. Erica and Boyd did too, if only because he trusted them to help him after he helped them (quid pro quo at the very least) and they left him behind when Geriatric Gerard came back and things went south (more than they already had, that is). And that’s it when it comes down to it. Which reminds him… 

He scowls and Allison blinks, now openly baffled, because this probably isn't what she expected when she planned to come see Stiles. He pays her no mind as his scowl deepens.

The thing is that as far as he’s concerned, at this point he doesn’t owe anything to Scott, much less Erica and Boyd. If anything it's the other way around by now, even if he will never cash it in. With Allison, they are even. He’s had to help her quite a few times and she has also helped Stiles, in both cases because of Scott. He does think Gerard was going to shoot to get her out of the way, granddaughter or not, so he saved her life... but she saved his too. So she helped him, he helped her and that's the end of it. But…

“Fuck.” Allison looks at him and arches her brow in a very Lydia reminiscent expression. He rubs his face frustrated for a moment. “I owe Peter one.”

After a second of silence she snorts, which earns her a glare that she dutifully ignores in favor of rummaging through her bag. She then proceeds to pass him a fully charged PSP and he stares at it as if it's an alien for a long minute. He arches a brow back at her lack of sympathy but turns it on nonetheless with a grumble, silently acknowledging her also silent petition for a truce/impasse/tentative friendship overture/whatever the hell you want to call it. He doesn't know why he accepts it, when he normally would have no qualms about kicking people he doesn't want around him out, but he's always trusted his gut and this time is not different, so he allows her to stay. The game starts automatically and he snorts amusedly at the screen. She not-so-quite hides a smile with her book.

“Seriously?”

Infected’s logo is on the opening screen. He rolls his eyes.

On the TV Pablo Antonio has already found out that he has cancer and Lucía Paola knows. She's crying, her mascara not budging even a bit, as she tells Marco Enrique that she can't elope with him (dramatic music) because she can't abandon her husband in that situation. When she leaves after one final kiss, Marco Enrique falls to his knees on the hay (more dramatic music) and starts crying as he softly begs her retreating back to stay. At the same time, Mariana Estrella is spying on them and has a very cruel and self-satisfied internal monologue about the whole thing after Lucía Paola has finally left, deeply enjoying the defeated and devastated look of Marco Enrique.

"Te lo dije," Stiles singsongs as he blasts a zombie in the game. "Y probablemente lo del cancer será un error del doctor," he adds, happily blasting another one. He catches Allison's eyes at the edge of his vision and shrugs, earning an amused snort from her. "What. I was bored."

He's still confused about why she has come to him, of all people, to speak to, even if she hasn't actually talked much about it. Time will tell, he supposes, and he has it to spare right now so... Besides if she keeps bringing her PSP he's not going to kick her out, because he's already tried to convince his dad to hook up his console to the hospital's TV and been refused.

"Do you have any Mario?"

She smiles in victory, as if she _did_ expect that outcome and Stiles rolls his eyes, lips twitching involuntarily.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Spanish:
> 
> "Oh, no, Marco Enrique, be careful! The mom is going to try to end you for sure! And Lucía Paola won't leave Pablo Antonio if she knows that he has cancer!"
> 
> And:
> 
> "I told you. And probably the cancer thing will be the doctor's mistake."
> 
> (Is it strange that I had so much fun writing the novela part? XD)
> 
> Thank you for reading! Please review :) and let me know what you think.


	4. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*
> 
> This last chapter was supposed to be about the sheriff but the timing was off and I have to leave it for the next. Ah, well…

Chapter 3

Stiles is angry. No, scratch that. Angry doesn’t even begin to cover the way he’s feeling right now. He’s livid with white-hot rage and his fury burns with the power of a thousand blazing suns and he’s outraged and he’s…

“… you know how I feel about her and that she doesn’t want to talk to me, and now I find out that she’s coming here every day? What the hell, man?!“

… going to seriously start considering murdering Scott where he stands if he doesn’t _shut up and leave_.

“I think I was perfectly clear,” he bites out instead, his jaw beginning to ache with the way he’s clenching it. Because, wishful thinking apart, murdering Scott is not a viable option, if only because he can't get out of bed without help yet. “But in case I wasn’t: get the fuck out of my room and _don’t come back_.“

“Stiles!”

He grits his teeth. The door is open so he doesn’t want to yell because, contrary to popular belief, he doesn’t enjoy causing a scene. Especially so in a public setting where it would reflect badly on his dad, because he’s done enough of that already with the whole Jackson debacle, thank you very much. It doesn't matter if his dad knows the truth now (even if that, admittedly, is a relief), because to the rest of the town the sheriff's son is going down a path of delinquency and if the man can't put his own son on the right track, how can he be in charge of an entire county? Stiles bets there are already countless malicious rumours about why he got shot by Principal Argent (whom they viewed as a very respectable member of the society) and he's not going to add fuel to the particular pyre that is his dad and his reputation. That's what matters right now. 

“Are you even listening?!”

From what he has been able to discern from Scott’s ramblings, he had been waiting to find Stiles alone so he wouldn’t be kicked out of the room. Normally, Stiles would applaud any kind of sneakiness coming from Scott and consider it a personal achievement... And maybe said sneakiness, his perseverance and a heartfelt apology would have even softened Stiles' stance... Except Scott's original idea of apologizing had quickly flown out the window the moment he had recognized several items in the room to be Allison’s, which made said apology a half-assed one at best.

Now, if Stiles hadn’t wanted to listen to the apology, he sure as hell didn’t want to listen to unfounded and undeserved recriminations. Again, the problem? He can’t move, so he can’t leave. And when he had called the nurse, surprise surprise, it turned out that it was Melissa on call. That hadn’t stopped Stiles from trying to have Scott removed from the premises, but Melissa had basically told them to not bother the staff with petty childish squabbles and to sort things out already.

That was ten minutes ago and no matter what he says Scott won’t leave him alone. He doesn’t seem to understand that a “ _let’s forget it, ok?_ ” is as insufficient as using a band-aid to patch a severed limb. And that was before his Allison related rant and wild not-so-subtle accusations.

Stiles is at the end of his tether. His father won’t be back for a couple of hours and with how much convincing it took to make him leave to go home and rest, Stiles is _not_ going to call him back. Allison would be able to reign Scott in too, but she's gone for the day, so there won’t be any help on that front. Calling the nurses will probably get him the same results, so that venue is closed too. His body is hurting everywhere with the way he’s tensing and the pounding in his head is getting steadily worse, to the point that he finds it difficult to keep his eyes open more than bare slits. He wants Scott gone.

_Now._

It happens in the blink of an eye. One moment Scott is ranting, the next he's not. Out of nowhere a hand clamps like a vice on the back of Scott’s neck, cutting the rambling abruptly in favor of startled spluttering. Said appendage is connected to none other than Peter Hale, who wastes no time unceremoniously sending Scott out of the room with so much ease that it should be considered insulting. The man stands there for no more than three seconds, his back to Stiles, before closing the door quietly. Scott doesn’t try to come in again.

Peter moves through the room like he owns it and Stiles opens his mouth, praying through the haze of pain that when words finally come out of it, they’re at least vaguely sarcastic and scathing and convey how much he didn’t need the rescue (pride over everything and all that jazz). Then Peter closes the curtains and the light goes down a few notches.

Stiles is so not proud of the relieved moan that escapes him.

It takes him a few moments to notice that Peter has sat down on a chair and is now fiddling with the PSP, apparently settling himself in for a lengthy stay. Peter snorts and sends him an amused all-knowing smirk (that, despite the pain, Stiles has the _need_ to wipe off) at the zombies game before putting the device aside. He then fishes a book out of his bag that would have Stiles drooling and making gimme hands at anyone on any good day and, after opening it, he lays a hand casually on Stiles' outstretched arm.

“That’s two, sweetheart.”

(Damn him, some very far away internal voice whines in Stiles.)

The teen grumbles something uncomplimentary but is too busy enjoying the drug-like effect the pain leaching thingie has. That it didn’t even cross Scott’s mind stings a little and he tries not to think about it. Yeah, Scott doesn’t know how to do it, but what hurts here is that he didn't even consider it.

\------

When he wakes up the next morning, Peter is gone but the bag is still there, obviously left behind on purpose. It's well within reach and Stiles doubts that's a coincidence. It takes a little effort to lift it onto the bed but he manages it eventually. When he opens it, the only thing that stops him from making an embarrassing hight-pitched sound is his father’s prone figure on the chair. He’s torn between giddy elation at the contents of the bag and exasperation at the werewolf's gall, because those books are either a bribe to get something or he's trying to butter up Stiles, there's no doubt about it.

About an hour later, during which he divides his attention between the books and Lucía Paola's misadventures, Allison arrives. His father takes advantage of her presence to hit home again after some nagging from Stiles. Allison, for her part, seems to lose part of her facade when John leaves, anger and frustration seeping through the placid mask. Stiles is pretty baffled because it's a great contrast with her previously calm attitude, just the day before. One doesn’t need to be a genius to guess where Scott went after being kicked out. After some time in comfortable silence, she finally sighs.

“I’m gonna take a wild guess” she drawls laying her chin on the palm of her hand, “and think that yesterday Scott gifted you with a visit as delightful as mine, yes?” Stiles’ lips twitch. “Or at least that’s what I got out of the load of self-righteous bullshit he was spouting after I told him how you helped me when Gerard tried to get me out of the way.“

And right there, stated with just one word, lies the problem and they both know it. Self-righteous. _Scott doesn’t feel he’s done wrong or that he should have done things differently._ He thinks that going behind everyone’s back was justified because it was for a good cause (be it defeating Gerard or getting Allison back or being cured) and that because of that everything is right.

In Allison’s case, does he think he’s pressuring her with his attitude? _What? Of course not! He’s just letting her know that he still loves her and that he’ll wait for her and that he doesn’t blame her because he understands completely…_ But the thing is Allison does feel she’s to be held accountable for what she’s done. Because she tried to punish people that didn’t deserve it, because she let herself be manipulated and did horrible things. And Scott may be able to live with it but she can’t. Besides, the way he puts her on a pedestal makes her uncomfortable and stressed because it’s like she has to be perfect to match his view of her, which sometimes makes her feel terribly inadequate and insecure. In a way that is what’s so relaxing for her about Stiles. There are no expectations, just an easy companionship where they both acknowledge the other’s bullshit even if they don’t always call it. Also, to be honest, the way Scott sometimes favors her in detriment of others leaves her with secondhand embarrassment and the need to apologize on his behalf.

In Stiles’ case, does he feel bad about him getting hurt? Yes, of course, but not in the sense of feeling _responsible_. And Stiles does believe he’s partly to blame because by not keeping him in the loop and actively omitting things and lying, Scott left him vulnerable, left him blind. But to be honest that’s not what bothers him the most, his fucked up priorities are. Before, he expected Stiles to understand and agree when he put his mother first, which, okay, yeah. But the problem is that nowadays everything goes before Stiles: his mother, Allison, Isaac, his wolfy problems, his dates… He calls because he’s trying to keep Derek and himself floating above eight feet of water while the kanima prowls around? _Stiles, I can’t right now! I’m having dinner with my future in-laws, can’t you see this is important?!_ He tries to find a way to cope with the fact that he’s basically destroyed his father’s career with the added bonus of what’s left of his relationship with him? _Dude, I can’t believe my mother punished me! I had a date with Allison! What a drag… can you come over to hear me complain about it for hours while you try to force Physics theory down my throat so I don’t flunk? She didn’t say no Stiles after all._ Bottom line, either Scott takes him for granted or he feels that Stiles owes him because he got him bitten. And if it’s the second, is he planning on milking it for the rest of his life? Don't get him wrong, Stiles acknowledges his part of the blame in that, but he also sees that Scott got a lot out of it. But then again Scott takes that for granted too, like it’s some sort of compensation for the terrible thing that is not being human anymore. Is it a wonder that he rubs the born wolves entirely wrong with that kind of attitude?

For whichever of those reasons it is, the truth is that both Allison and Stiles concur in that he needs a good reality check.

“Did Peter Hale really threaten him?” she murmurs as her attention gets caught on Marco Enrique's shirtless form as he tends to the horses. She lets out an appreciative hum and Stiles sniggers when that interested look turns into a frown because the view gets interrupted by Mariana Estrella.

“More like tossed him out of here and glared… looked at him," he inserts a Superman eye powers motion with his hands, "intensely into submission. From what I saw, Peter probably doesn’t think him enough of a challenge to deserve a full glare.“ He snorts before groaning. “He implied I owe him. Again,” he whines despairingly as he throws an arm over his face.

He then grumbles mutinously and gives her a dirty look at her snickers when he finally tells her what happened exactly, one of the books clutched in his hands. To her credit, she doesn’t comment about Peter’s presence more than to wonder with Stiles about the man’s intentions. There’s a silent offer of assistance in retaliation if he attempts anything funny that makes him feel warm inside, though.

“If it makes you feel better, I tasered Scott yesterday,” she finally admits, a hint of regret in her voice, because he was her first love and that doesn’t disappear just like that, no matter how much she has tried to lie to herself since her mother died.

After a second, they both cackle helplessly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please review :) and let me know what you think.
> 
> Thanks [@nineorfour](https://tmblr.co/mukyLNts2OHZG9R4qM1ik0g) for proofing this.


	5. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*
> 
> I finished this earlier than I expected because I already had part of this written when I posted last chapter. _This_ was supposed to be the last chapter, but the timing was off.
> 
> Proofed by @nineofour, thank You!!!

Chapter 4

John guides his cruiser into the drive and groans a bit as he leaves it, his back protesting after so many nights sleeping at the hospital. He straightens and sighs as his spine pops, easing the pain quite a bit. Hopefully, he thinks absently, a long hot shower will take care of the rest of the aches in his body. A nap in his own bed will do wonders too, he bets.

He has been unceremoniously kicked out of the hospital to go home and change his clothes because, apparently, he stinks… and badly at that. According to Stiles, his love and dedication have been noted and appreciated but his personal eau de toilette not so much. He thinks the little brat actually slurred that word on purpose to make it sound like toilet.

He shakes his head exasperatedly and rolls his eyes fondly. The brat has even given him express _orders_ to not come back for at least a couple of hours and to rest for a bit. He wonders what he must have done in past lives to deserve such a smartass of a son.

At that thought he pauses, finally taking notice of what he’s actually doing instead of going to take a shower like he should be. The shame hits him like a ton of bricks and for a moment the pressure in his chest is so heavy that it feels like he can’t breathe.

He’s been trying to understand why his sixteen year old son has felt the need to lie and go behind his back, to endure pain and suffering to protect his father when it should be the other way round (because the notion is as aberrant as a parent burying their child) and here he has the answer. He lets go of the bottle as if it burns him. His legs are failing him so he takes a seat, eyeing it horrified. He doesn’t need to look at the sink to know that there will be more tumblers than dirty dishes from when he hit home the past few days, when Melissa forced him to go home while Stiles was unconscious. He dreads counting the empty bottles but he forces himself to do it anyway. The number is staggering.

There is no excuse that will justify it.

He wonders when Stiles started protecting him, trying to take care of everything. If it was when, years ago, he subconsciously chose to be a husband before a father (then a drunk and then a sheriff) it wouldn’t surprise him. It was likely at the same time that his boy learned how to cook and do the laundry and clean and a million other things he shouldn’t have been doing at his age.

With sudden clarity, he remembers the moment when it all started to go downhill. He remembers trying to comfort Claudia instead of Stiles, even if the handprint on his son's face was an angry red that contrasted heavily with his lily-white skin. She never touched him again because John finally decided that the hospital was a better place for her, because he couldn't be there all the time (bills needed to be paid and they were starting to pile up... and neither of their remaining families were willing to help) and what had happened was not going to be repeated ever again. Except at one point (John doesn't know exactly when) he started to cover more and more shifts, and then he had to visit the hospital every day... and Stiles was such a mature kid that started having dinner prepared when he arrived home... And John admonished him for using the stove, he really did, because he knew Stiles was too young to be cooking with fire, but the kid kept doing it when his dad wasn't there to stop him. And suddenly, it became a relief to not have to worry about dinner on top of everything else. Or about the laundry, or the cleaning, or...

And then Claudia died.

And even though Stiles was there when it happened and John should have been focusing on his little boy, he remembers thinking _I just need this night, this one night to forget about everything, I'll be the responsible adult, the father, tomorrow_ as he opened one bottle or another (maybe it was whisky?) on the day of the funeral. Stiles was asleep, he remembers that... but not much else afterwards. And one night turned into two, then three, then four... then weeks, months, years... to this day.

John cautiously sniffs his own breath and shirt and then he closes his eyes, pained beyond belief. He wonders if Stiles’ joke had a deeper meaning that he hadn’t caught at the moment… He knows his son is bright, there is no way this has escaped his notice. Either the joke had no deeper meaning because he’s used to this kind of situation happening or it was a way to make him shower so others wouldn’t notice. Both possibilities are equally terrifying.

He eyes the kitchen warily and forces himself to get up and go to the sink. There are some dirty dishes but not many, because apparently if Stiles isn’t here to make sure he eats healthy, John has the diet of a twenty year old college bachelor (meaning cheap take-out) with the cleaning habits to match. He sighs at the sight of the many tumblers and he knows there aren’t more because he sometimes reuses them. Resolved, he starts by cleaning everything in the sink and tries to remember when it was the last time he did something like this.

He can’t.

That has to change. It _will_ change.

John is a cop, he knows how addicts work. It hurts to think of himself as one, but the title (and the pain) is well deserved. He searches every cranny for alcohol and, with a deep breath, he proceeds to pour it down the sink. Even the cooking wine suffers the same fate but he knows the drill, knows it’s better to remove temptation just in case he hits a rough patch in the future. At last, John gathers the trash, puts the bottles in and takes it outside.

After the kitchen is clean and tidy, he goes to take that shower. He spends more time than he normally would in it, but he’s feeling incredibly dirty right now. Finally, he gets out with a sigh, knowing that this is not a kind of filthiness that can be taken care of with something so simple as soap and water. He also knows that it will take him a lot of time to feel clean again.

John tries to figure out how the washing machine works, what program to use and the meanings of the little icons in the clothing tags. It’s an exercise in frustration and in the end he has to admit defeat and simply sort his clothes into the baskets Stiles has for that purpose. And isn’t this situation telling? That he depends on Stiles for something like doing the laundry because _he doesn’t know how?_

Being the way he is now nearly cost him his son. He vows to do better, to change things, to be dependable again.

Following that train of thought, he ponders the situation they are in. There’s a whole hidden world of supernatural beings his son is now part of. Those beings are faster, stronger and more often than not don’t follow the law because they have their own more brutal rules. He knows that attempting to pull him out won’t work, his son is magic after all, which is something shocking on its own, to be honest. So the only option left to him is to make sure Stiles is prepared, to give him the tools to always come out on top.

If he has to comb through shady occult shops for magic books he will do it, damn it. John just has to figure out where to start, that’s all, because he doubts it’s as easy as that. He knows that if it was that simple, Stiles would have already done so and, by now, John would have unknowingly been fielding calls left and right about strange happenings like sudden explosions or typhoons or whatever. Or maybe not. His son could be a sneaky little brat like that, he snorts. With that thought in mind though, he grabs a coffee, his car keys and decides to pay some visits. He has questions and Argent is going to answer them _or else_.

Answer them, he does. John has no qualms about going armed or threatening the man. His son was beat up in Argent's basement and shot in his kitchen by the hunter's father. He should be happy that John is a reasonable man that doesn't put a bullet in him just on principle, because he understands that he had knowledge of what was happening. Besides, Christopher Argent knows that the Sheriff can make his life hell if he wants, so he knows to play nice. 

It’s testament about his life at the moment that, after a lengthy conversation with the man, he ends up at the veterinarian's and he isn’t even fazed.

John is certainly not a happy camper when one Alan Deaton reveals himself to be an unhelpful cryptic fucker that only tells him something about sparks and that _belief is power_ and then proceeds to give him a small bag filled with mountain ash. By the end of his conversation with the veterinarian, he’s starting to feel frustrated homicidal urges, even if you can’t tell from the look on his face.

Well, Stiles didn’t get his vindictiveness from his mother, he muses when he spots the man’s car parked where it shouldn’t be.

When he goes back to the hospital room, Stiles is asleep so peacefully (in clear contrast with the previous nights) that it makes him release a sigh of relief. The Argent girl must have come back when he was gone because there’s a black leather bag that wasn’t there before. It has a classic tasteful design, one that screams that it’s probably way more expensive than what it looks like. On second thought, revisiting what he knows about her, he’s quite sure it’s not hers. He resists the temptation to go through it because if he wants to rebuild his relationship with Stiles, he has to start with at least respecting his privacy. 

He knows Stiles omits and lies a lot, but how much of that was a direct result of all this supernatural debacle that he has been trying to cover up? How much of John’s own lack of dependability? He has to be the one to take the first step and break the habit of being suspicious of everything Stiles does. And maybe, maybe, if he demonstrates that he’s willing at the very least to give the benefit of the doubt, his son can learn to depend on him once again. Or more than depend (because he understands that Stiles is self-sufficient by now and nothing is going to change that), maybe lean on or share with his dad the burden if the need arises instead of trying to shoulder everything on his own. There’s a lot of baggage but perhaps, with both of them making an effort, they can learn to trust each other again. He hopes it’s not too late and that Stiles hasn’t given up on him completely. Oh, he knows his son loves him, of that he has no doubt, but you can love someone and at the same time, not.

John runs his hand over his son’s buzz cut and settles in for another uncomfortable night full of neck and back pains with easy resignation. For a moment he longs for the familiar weight of a tumbler in his hand but he squashes the desire ruthlessly.

The next morning, even though he’s worried as hell, he forces himself to crack a Harry Potter joke as he passes Stiles the mountain ash and the scarce information he has. His effort pays off because something loosens in his boy as he laughs delightedly. Stiles promises to be careful and to keep him informed of how his progress goes.

Well, it’s a start, he muses.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please review :) and let me know what you think.


	6. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*
> 
> Proofed by @nineofour. Thank you~

Chapter 5

“Frankly, it’s none of your business, Melissa,” his father says with a hard edge to his voice that he’s never heard him use with the woman, “or mine for that matter.”

“John!“

“ _No_. If Stiles doesn’t want to talk to Scott, it’s his choice and you have no right to overrule it.“ John then continues implacably, his frown as deep as his voice. “What’s more, you know that’s true or you wouldn’t have waited until I went to the cafeteria to ambush him.“

“Ambush?!“ Melissa exclaims appalled.

Stiles glares mutinously at Scott, who’s nearly hiding behind his mother. This is entirely his fault for not letting things rest and wanting to get what he wants when he wants, in any way he can. Scott lifts his chin defiantly but also shifts restlessly, knowing as much as Stiles that things are rapidly getting out of hand. That’s suddenly proved true when the woman finally reaches her limit nearly five minutes later, his dad’s calm demeanor fueling her ire rather than the opposite.

“It’s his fault that my son’s a werewolf! If he hadn't roped Scott into going into the forest that night, none of this would have happened!“

Stiles recoils as if struck, sucking in a pained gasp. His fists tighten on his lap as he tries to not let it show. Well, that answers his question then… At the same time, John stills and visibly takes a deep fortifying breath, the only outward indication that gives of his rapidly eroding patience with Melissa. His voice is level when he finally speaks. 

“I’ve talked with Stiles about what happened.“

“And you believe him? All he does is lie!”

“ _The only reason your son doesn’t have to lie is because Stiles does it for him_ ,“ John snaps before taking the reigns of his temper again. Melissa sputters, outraged. ”Before, when Stiles misbehaved, which didn’t happen all that frequently, and I’m talking about small things, not serious ones, he would never lie to me to my face. Oh, he would try to talk himself out of trouble, of course, but he only started really lying when he began covering for Scott’s lycanthropy.“

“Which he’s directly responsible for!”

“I know what happened. I’ve talked to Stiles, to Allison and Christopher Argent… Heck, I’ve even talked to Derek Hale and Isaac Lahey.“ Stiles looks at him surprised. “Bottom line, it may have been Stiles’ idea to go into the woods that night but Scott _chose_ to go with him, no one forced him. So yes, Stiles may have part of the responsibility in this whole debacle, but your son doesn’t come clean either.” John then frowns and adopts his classic don’t-fuck-with-me cop pose. “Stiles helped Scott learn control and has been busting his ass to aid him in any way he can. He has nearly died more times than I can stomach… and once nearly by Scott’s hand! This last time, he got tortured and nearly died as a direct result of Scott’s lies and manipulations. As far as I’m concerned, Stiles has more than sufficiently atoned for his part of what happened.“

“ _My son’s going to be a werewolf forever!_ ”

“I hope that you aren’t suggesting what I think you are suggesting, Melissa, but by your face… Get out.“ 

“What.“

“If you think I’m going to let Scott use and abuse Stiles for the rest of his life or until it satisfies the distorted sense of justice you both seem to have, you have another thing coming. _Out_.”

There's a silent standstill in which both Melissa and John look at each other angrily, as if their glares are going to achieve what their words haven't. Stiles' stomach churns and he wants to vomit, feeling incredibly guilty about the entire situation. He has never regretted more going searching for Laura's body than he does now.

“We’re leaving, Scott. _Now_ ,“ Melissa snaps finally, turning to leave abruptly and exiting the room without a backwards glance.

“Peter Hale is the one that bit me and killed all those people and Stiles has been seeing him,“ Scott blurts out like a parting shot as his mom reenters to pull him out of the room. He resists for a moment and then adds as if it’s just an afterthought. “He’s dangerous.”

“Interesting that you prioritize your bite before the killings, Scott. And now that you proved to me that you don’t care about hurting Stiles or throwing him under the bus when it suits you, I am the one that doesn’t want you around him.“ Scott gapes as his plan backfires spectacularly. “You’re not welcome in my home anymore. _Out_.”

Father and son remain silent for a while afterwards, John trying to keep his temper in check and Stiles attempting to get his mortification under control and failing.

“I’m so sorry, dad.”

“Don’t be," John sighs tiredly. "This is not your fault, son.” 

“But…”

“No buts,” he cuts him off gently and helps him into the wheelchair so they can finally leave the hospital. “Melissa is an adult, Stiles, she should already know perfectly well that what she attempted to do today was wrong. You’re smart, son, you know she was abusing her position of power and I won’t tolerate her doing that. And what I said about Scott is true too.” Stiles presses his lips together because, no matter the hard stance he had taken, deep down he had hoped to mend things with his first friend in the future, when he finally matured. “Unless he changes a lot, I don’t want him near you.“

“I… I wasn’t going to forgive him that easily, anyway.”

“I know, son," John says softly as he lets a hand rest on Stiles' buzzcut lovingly, "and I wanted to let you handle this situation by yourself and make your own choices but I couldn’t not intervene.“

“Okay,“ Stiles sighs, trying to smile reassuringly and failing.

“Okay? I somehow expected more opposition… and certainly more defense of Scott.“

“I… I just had already thought about all this stuff, dad.“

_He’s just really tired of people using him and then discarding him when he’s served his purpose._

He doesn’t need to say it out loud for his dad to hear, though. John's heart twists in his chest.

“Come on," he says after squeezing Stiles' shoulder. He goes around the wheelchair to start pushing him towards the exit. "Let's get you home and then you can tell me what’s really happening with Peter Hale, okay?“ 

Later, when Stiles is finally in his own bed, he forces himself to tell his father about Peter because it’s obvious his dad is making an effort to mend things between them, so he’s not going to do any less himself. John is not amused but is willing to give the man the benefit of doubt because _what would he have done in his situation?_ He knows himself enough to admit that if he couldn’t get justice any other way… Just the thought that Scott nearly killed his boy when he was out of control makes his blood turn to ice and want to…

Peter Hale didn’t bite Stiles when he said no… he didn’t especially hurt him either. He also saved him when he was about to die and helped him when Scott was harassing him.

Yes, he’s willing to give him the benefit of doubt all right, no matter that his motives seem sketchy at best. But if he tries anything funny, he now has wolfsbane bullets, his aim has always been excellent... and he knows how to get rid of a body without getting caught.

—

Stiles spends his first week at home doing exactly three things and nothing more.

First, directing his father around the kitchen with a good amount of lighthearted bickering between them. He takes in the disappearance of the alcohol in stride and apart from hugging his dad and distracting him with the weirdest wikifact he can remember when the man's having a bad moment, he doesn’t say a thing. He’s happy with reservations. He hopes it’s a permanent change, though. Also, let it be known that his sassy explanation on how to use the washing machine and the meaning of the tag’s icons was a thing of beauty that should be printed and framed.

Second, marathoning Leverage and having Mario Kart tournaments with Allison. She’s a vicious little shit and he’s impressed because he knows the only reason she doesn’t play dirtier is because the game’s software won’t allow it. He retaliates in kind and it’s awesome.

Third, experimenting with the mountain ash and utterly failing. Belief is power, his ass. He’s really frustrated with his lack of progress until after Allison suggests they continue watching Naruto from where they left it at the hospital (she said that while Marco Enrique's scantily clad form was a thing of beauty, she would stage a mutiny if she had to stand any more absurd plot twists, so Stiles only watched the novelas when she wasn't there) they reach the part about Gaara and his gourd of sand. Inspiration hits. Hard. Allison rolls her eyes and lets him be. She also hogs the popcorn and he doesn’t even notice.

By the seventh day at home, his father can make an omelet without burning it, Allison has a drawer in his bathroom and in his closet and the mountain ash is his bitch.

He asks her to attack (to call it something) him randomly to try to develop some kind of reflex. She agrees so eagerly that he knows he going to regret asking later. He does. Sort of. Probably because he’s still too slow, but mostly because she’s sneaky as hell.

—

Halfway through the second week his father has to go back to work, but only half shifts until the next Monday, he assures him. Stiles understands because it’s not like they are swimming in money and now they have even more medical bills to pay when they were just finishing settling his mother’s. He’s feeling guilty as hell and not even the gentle headslap his dad had given him this morning with a _don’t worry about it, son, your stay in the hospital wasn’t that expensive, I have it under control_ can calm him. Maybe he should start selling essays again…

As per usual Allison climbs with ease and grace into his room through the window. The first time she did it, it went along the lines:

_“Stiles, you were ordered bed rest for a reason. If you get up more than what's strictly necessary you’ll pull the stitches…”_

“ _I didn’t!_ “

“ _Oh, don’t worry, Mr. S, he didn’t get up, I climbed to the window so he wouldn’t have to._ “

_John eyes the window, his poker face firmly in place. He knows there’s no lever or tree or anything that can be used as leverage to climb. Allison is all big wide innocent eyes and too-sweet-for-words earnest smile. John is instantly suspicious._

“ _What._ “

Bottom line, more often than not she comes through the window like the ninja princess she is and there’s even a little welcome mat (I love it when you wipe your feet on me, it makes me feel so dirty!) and a pair of cute slippers there. She tries to come through the door if John is home though, so there’s that at least.

He directs the mountain ash from the pouch in his bedside table to trap her as she climbs down. He found by accident that, apparently, he can make the mountain ash work with humans too if he wants to. He hasn’t seen any reference of that happening in the books Peter gave him or over the Internet but he’s not going to complain anyway, gift horse and all that. Allison glares playfully at him and he grins, commanding it back. 

“You’re getting faster.” He grins again, stupidly proud. “Call of duty?“

“Cool.”

Stiles gets instantly something’s on when she suggests that game, which he knows for a fact she doesn’t particularly like… except when she’s had an argument with her dad. Also because she doesn’t sneakily attack him either and he doubts it is because she wants to keep him on his toes. Nonetheless, he keeps silent because that’s how they work. She’ll tell him when she’s ready… or not. He won’t pressure her no matter what.

For the next hour he proceeds to cream her so badly it’s embarrassing… which is proof enough in itself that her mind is elsewhere, because normally they are more evenly matched. Finally, she cracks.

“My dad wants us to go to France for the rest of the summer.“ Stiles doesn't stop playing and snipes her from above. She grunts and waits, setting off the moment her character is alive again. “At first he suggested-” she adds air quotation marks there along with an eye roll before shooting at Stiles, trying to enact revenge for her previous premature death, “it but now he says it’s final, that I’m going whether I like it or not. It’s not that I don’t like going to France…”

She’s confused because her thoughts are going in ten different directions at the same time and it shows pretty blatantly on her face. Stiles finally pauses the game and turns to look at her. Her eyes remain glued on the screen.

“First before anything, do you want my opinion or to bitch at your dad?“ Allison elbows him mercilessly and he grins. “Or we can do both, I’m versatile like that.“ Stiles waggles his eyebrows and that finally gets him the response he was looking for when she laughs and turns towards him. “Maybe you shouldn’t fight going to France.”

“ _What_ ,“ she gapes incredulously.

“I think it would be good for you to disconnect from Beacon Hills and all the drama, that’s all. You know… to have perspective from afar and all that shit? Also, if your father is hell-bent on going it’s not like you’re gonna be able to do anything about it… Why not take advantage then? Maybe…" He bites his lip and focuses his attention on the paused screen. What he says next draws a sharp breath from Allison. “Maybe talk about your mom? I don’t mean to overstep, sorry! It’s just that my dad and I… we never… that kind of thing festers, you know?”

They stay in silence for a couple of minutes before she rests her head on his shoulder. He lets out the breath he was holding.

“Yeah, I know… I kind of forget…“ She swallows painfully and clears her throat. “I always forget that he lost his wife when I lost my mother, you know? Well, not exactly forget but, you know?“ She’s whispering as if talking louder is physically impossible for her under the weight of her grief. “Thanks for being honest, Stiles.”

“Sure, anytime.“ She gives him a strained smile. “So getting on with what I promised you… let the bitching commence! Your father’s such a dick, forcing you like that… What the hell, man, like as if these were the medieval times and women were property or something!”

She laughs gratefully as he rambles on and then proceeds to trounce him for the next half hour because, apparently, her accuracy with a bow in real life translates into mad virtual sniping skills when she's hell-bent on revenge.

“He’s going to regret it when he sees the phone bill for the international videocalls, though.“

They both cackle evilly. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please review :) and let me know what you think.


	7. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks @nineofour for proofing this~

Chapter 6

Stiles doesn’t know what woke him up but he reacts before coherent thinking even kickstarts. Then, a second after the act and with his brain finally as awake as the rest of his body, he remembers that Allison left two days ago and realizes there may very well be a real threat in his room… still in the middle of the night, judging by the lack of natural light. He reaches to his right hastily and grabs his bat in a white-knuckled fist.

“Impressive,” Peter muses as he tries to work out how he got trapped in the first place, since Stiles hasn’t moved from the bed.

"Thanks," he deadpans in a flat tone, wishing he could just go back to sleep but knowing it's not an option.

Stiles scowls and turns on the light to find the man on his windowmat, inside a mountain ash circle (he tries to decide if he’s more proud of his accomplishment than irritated he's had to use it to begin with...). The werewolf pokes at the invisible barrier and hisses at the faint electrical discharge he receives in return at the contact (... and irritation wins). Stiles grins vindictively (he can, after all, choose to make it hurt or not, and the level of pain it inflicts too), aggravated at being woken up at… yep, five in the morning.

“You know that if I had an actual weapon this wouldn’t stop it, right? A mountain ash circle doesn’t actually stop objects thrown out from the inside. Or vice versa. The only reason it normally works so well for hunters (apart from the trapping thing, that is) is because weres tend to rely on their claws,” Peter points out as he wiggles his completely human fingers at Stiles.

“Is that so?” he can’t resist sassing back at the man, scooting up in his bed to relax against the headboard.

One day, he knows, his mouth will be his downfall. Peter stills for a second and then grins delightedly. He looks contemplatively at his bag, seemingly deciding what to sacrifice, then takes out his phone (what the hell is that brick?!). Stiles smirks in advance. Peter takes notice and seems to be enjoying his vindictiveness way too much, seeing that he's the recipient of it. The werewolf deliberately throws that relic of the prehistoric era at the barrier, which fries the phone immediately with clearly visible shocks of electricity. Both of them eye the smoke coming from it almost transfixed.

“That had way more voltage than before… Neat. I hadn’t actually counted on it killing the phone though, to be honest.“ Peter shrugs. “Ah, well, I’m sure my dear nephew won’t be too heartbroken by the loss… He didn’t notice it was gone, after all.”

Stiles chokes on his own spit and coughs first, then he can’t help laughing. His amusement is such that he actually has to smother the sound with his hand to avoid waking up his dad. Peter looks terribly satisfied and the normally crafty man doesn’t even bother to hide it.

“Soooo… any reason why you’re here?” he inquires when he finally has his mirth under control, tapping his fingers absently on the handle of the bat.

“Stiles, you wound me," Peter protests and Stiles' lips twitch involuntarily. The teen also finds it terribly amusing the way the werewolf is nonchalantly avoiding touching the invisible walls of his current prison and managing to make it look like he isn't even trying. In fact, Stiles finds it so amusing that he keeps the fact that the mountain ash isn't active any more silent. "Do I need one?”

“At the moment, yes," Stiles answers pragmatically.

Instead of getting angry at the rebuttal, Peter’s eyes shine with an odd sort of satisfaction. Stiles notes it but doesn't comment, content to mule over the mystery for now.

“Derek wants to ask you something.”

“You want me to believe he sent you? Or, more likely, you heard him talking to Isaac and decided to come yourself?”

“Semantics.” Stiles snorts at the dismissive hand gesture of the man. “He wanted to ask you about those two betas that pulled the disappearance act. I haven’t bothered learning their names.” He makes a dismissive motion with his hand again, this time accompanied by a matching facial expression, and if that was an actual thing, Stiles would die from a sass overload.

“What about them? What can he want to ask me that they don’t know the answer of?” Peter looks at him with a curious expression. “What?”

“Derek doesn’t know where they are and they aren’t answering their phone. There are trails of them in the preserve but they are nowhere to be found. Hasn’t Scott told you? He’s been combing the preserve with Isaac. Derek is positively _thrilled_ with the double loyalties the curly puppy is sporting.”

Stiles grits his teeth to stop a scathing remark from escaping. The nerve of that… He tries to take a calming breath. Peter eyes him bewildered but doesn’t say a word. He can tell he’s surprised the man, a real feat with how tight-fisted his control normally is. Stiles gets up brusquely, his side protesting, drawing a pained grunt out of him, and paces the room restlessly.

No matter how much he can’t stand the sight of Scott at the moment and how angry he's with him, he would never do something like leaving him unaware of a threat, blind and vulnerable. Stiles doesn’t care about whatever the fuck is his reasoning, you just don’t… And Scott _knows_ that his father is law enforcement and is going to probably be right in the middle of it, especially since he now is in the know, because _Scott himself let the fucking cat out of the fucking bag._ Stiles finally snarls irately and lets himself fall back on the bed face-first.

“I take it you didn’t know?” Peter inquires carefully.

“Tell Derek that the last time I saw them was when they left me to die. They seemed fine enough to run with their fucking tails between their legs,” Stiles answers, his voice is muffled by the sheets because he hasn't bothered turning to address the man.

Minutes pass while Stiles tries not to reach the boiling point. He knows if he doesn’t get a grip on his temper, he’ll march to the McCall’s and do something like threaten Scott with opening him up, belly to throat, with a rusty knife. Maybe he needs to make the verbal equivalent of an overkill for it to penetrate his thick skull? Because everything else seems to be failing, dammit.

“Any reason you’re still here, creeperwolf?” He heaves himself to his elbows, eyebrow raised.

“I’m thrilled you think me so resourceful, sweetheart, but I’m not actually capable of doing the impossible,” Peter drawls crossing his arms.

“You came back from the dead,” Stiles deadpans.

“Yes, yes, do _one_ measly impossible-ish" he does the magic fingers with one hand to accompany the word, “thing and be forever expected to pull miracles from where the sun doesn’t shine. Rude.” He fixes a faux stern expression on Stiles. “If you’d be so kind to break the barrier?”

“Peter,” he enunciates slowly, a little mocking and enjoying every second of it, “I took it down when you fried Derek’s phone. Take that trash with you, by the way.”

The werewolf blinks and then again has that odd satisfied expression that Stiles doesn’t even bother deciphering but files away for later inspection, too content having one upped Peter again.

“I’ll let you know if something new comes up,” the man says as he leaps to the window sill and then disappears.

Stiles is left there gaping. The phone is still there too, mocking him from where it rests completely charred on the windowmat. He would be cursing the man if there weren’t two new ancient looking books there that Stiles didn't even notice him leaving. Sneaky bastard.

Since there’s no use in trying to sleep again, he peruses the tomes carefully. It takes him no time to notice that these are the kinds of books that you have to handle with actual, honest to god, gloves (partly for preservation, partly because of the possible mites and pseudoscorpions). He first stops in his bathroom to wash his hands and face. Then he proceeds to clear his desk to gain some much needed space and gets his gloves from the drawer to put them on. Now ready, he prepares himself to be immersed in ancient literature and to be wowed. 

Or well…The wowing will have to wait because he hasn’t the faintest idea of what they are about.

The first one he can’t understand at all. As in, he doesn’t even recognize the language it’s written in. A quick google search shows nothing, not even suggestions. Stiles rakes his head for the answer. Is it the language of some kind of supernatural species? He doubts it, Peter wouldn’t give him something he had no way of translating, right? _Right?_ Stubbornly, he refuses to give up and call defeat on the challenge the man is undoubtedly issuing. It's embarrassing and Stiles won't probably ever admit it, but it takes him a disgustingly long time to work out that the book is encrypted. 

He loves cryptography... 

He doesn’t know how the man found out.

He forces himself to put it aside for a moment to check the second tome. It’s completely written in runes and Stiles knows enough about them to identify them as Germanic. But which one of the alphabets is it? Further research reveals it to be Elder Futhark, sometimes mixed with some other system he can’t seem to find.

These books are a goldmine of entertainment already and he doesn’t even know what they are about yet. The other two books that Stiles has already devoured had been about supernatural history both and he had enjoyed them immensely. If these are even near as good… Stiles twitches. Which one to choose…

He grabs the one filled with Runes, opens a Word document in his laptop and a lot of tabs with runic charts in his phone. God, how he wished he had another laptop. He starts translating. It appears to be easy enough to match the runes to translate it… until he realizes a couple of paragraphs later that he still doesn’t understand a thing. He looks at the document pouting before he decides to copy and paste the first line into the search bar of google. He thunks his head on the table. He searches runes in wikipedia and reads all the related posts. He tries to match the language of some of the translations there with his own. One word finally clicks with one of the Tune Stone. Proto-Norse.

That means that to read the second book, apart from actually translating the runes, he has to learn a Germanic language (Swedish, Danish or Norwegian), then from there the Old East Norse (the first two) or Old West Norse (the third) and _from there_ , with the phonetic rules, what has been already translated and all that shit, try his hand at Proto-Norse. Never mind that experts can only begin to guess with the scant examples they have nowadays.

And fucking Peter Hale has an entire book.

At the very least.

“You beautiful bastard…”

“Who?”

“Gah!!!”

John watches amused as Stiles flails and only him rapidly securing his son prevents him from falling from the chair.

“Need a hand there, son?” he inquires, mouth quirking and face showing clearly that he thinks his son is a dork.

“Nope," Stiles pipes back, popping the p. "I’m perfect.”

“Does it hurt?” John finally asks worried, his amusement rapidly fading.

“If you count my pride…” Stiles grumbles. “No, really dad, I’m fine. The stitches just, well… itch.”

“You’ve always healed fast,“ he muses and eyes the books on the desk. “Did you sleep, Stiles?” 

“Yeah?”

“Are you asking me or telling me?” John fixes him with an unimpressed look.

Ah… full disclosure for the sake of a good relationship with his dad can be _so_ problematic… The temptation to omit Peter’s presence in his room is high. He squashes it ruthlessly.

“Peter came by this morning. Derek wanted to ask me about Erica and Boyd because apparently they’re missing _again_ and I’m the one that saw them last?“

“There’s a wonderful invention called the phone and something known as polite calling hours.”

“Yeah, but Derek was raised by wolves, you know. Like, literally.” John rolls his eyes and Stiles finishes a summary of what happened. He’s aware that although he’s not lying, he’s phrasing things to put Peter in a good light. “He didn’t even move from the window, dad. And to be honest, I’m glad he came or we wouldn’t have known about it.”

“I suppose.”

“He also said he’ll inform me if there’s anything new? Which is way more than I can say about the others… including Scott.” 

“Okay, but no more visiting through the window for anyone. I like knowing who’s in my house.” He stops Stiles before he can protest. “I draw the line at Allison.” Stiles grins and looks at the windowmat, only to squint when he notices a tiny slip of paper on it.

“I’ll fire him a text to let him know.“

“And since when do you have his number?”

“Today?” 

“Come on,” John sighs long-suffering. “We’re having pancakes before I leave for the station. I’m gonna get it this time even if it kills me.” Stiles snickers remembering last time’s product.

Before going downstairs he checks the slip of paper. Sure enough it has Peter’s number on it. He saves it in his phone and puts the little paper in his drawer along with the brick of a phone.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _You forgot to take out the trash. No treats for you_.

 **From Creeperwolf:** _Sorry, honey, I’ll do better next time_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _Next time use the door_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _And call beforehand_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _Not at ungodly hours_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _If it is an emergency you can_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _I think I covered all my bases? I don’t know if I should feel impressed by your ability to find loopholes or not_.

 **From Creeperwolf:** _I have that effect on people_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _Also you’re a sadistic bastard_.

 **From Creeperwolf:** _So you like the books_.

Stiles debates with himself for a moment before he goes for it.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _I do, thanks_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _But you’re still a sadist and a bastard_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _And I’m going to steal your library_.

 **From Creeperwolf:** _You’ll try, you mean. You don’t even know where it is_.

 **From Creeperwolf:** _Nice Batman pajamas by the way_. 

A strangled noise escapes Stiles as he squirms spastically in embarrassment. He lets himself fall face-first to the bed and wiggles, trying to smother himself with the comforter. That… that bastard! He finally deflates and reluctantly concedes defeat. This time.

“Stiles!”

“Coming!”

Once in the kitchen, he checks out Allison's latest message. Despite threatening to, she still hasn’t tried wiping out her father’s bank account via international videocalls. He smiles at the picture of her eating a croissant for breakfast and the _wishing you were here_ underneath.

His father curses.

“Not a word.”

To his dad’s chagrin, he takes a picture of himself staring mournfully at the burned pancakes and sends it to her accompanied by a _me too_.

“Brat,“ his dad sighs long-suffering, earning a cheeky grin from Stiles.

—

 **From Creeperwolf:** _It occurs to me now that if Scott hasn’t told you about patrolling, he hasn’t informed you about the alpha pack either_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _The what now?_

 **To Creeperwolf:** _Use the window_.

There’s an almost immediate knock on his window and Stiles sighs. Loopholes. He turns to see Peter lounging in his window sill as if he owns it.

“I hope that that’s only a name and not an actual pack of alphas.” He accepts the brown paper bag the werewolf passes him with a good amount of suspicion. His eyes widen incredulously at the double fudge brownie cupcake inside. After the pancake fiasco of this morning he bites into it with gusto.

“You looked so heartbroken that I couldn’t resist.” Stiles almost chokes and Peter smirks delighted. He takes out his phone and, sure enough, he had sent him the pic too. He recovers his footing fast. "Is it good?"

“Alpha pack?” he asks, mouth partially full, and Peter explains, his sarcasm a beautiful thing that makes clear what he thinks about the policing thing they got going.

“So we don’t actually know if they are a threat or not,” Peter finishes.

“Let’s face it, this pack is a mess. If they really police if packs are adequate…“

“Exactly. Two runaway betas, another one with divided loyalties, an almost omega wolf that won’t submit or join the pack and…”

“A zombie?” he jibes.

“I thought we were listing the problems of Derek’s pack?” Stiles’ lips twitch at the man’s sass.

Later, when Peter is gone, his already finished books in hand, Stiles suddenly blinks and thinks. Huh.

With the information provided by Peter, Allison and his father, plus what he gleamed in Scott’s rant, now he can more or less accurately set a timeline of the events that happened.

When Stiles disappeared, Scott misled his father into thinking nothing was wrong and then recruited Isaac to help find him via scent, but before they could actually proceed, Peter and Derek showed up. After a little tête-à-tête (Peter’s words), Melissa called really freaked out because Jackson, who was supposed to be dead, was inside a cocoon that definitely wasn’t there before.

At some point there, which was about an hour after being kidnapped, Gerard had finally appeared and was roughing Stiles up after he tried to free Erica and Boyd for the first time… and badmouthed him into kingdom come. A little after that, his father, who was checking the hospital just in case, received a call from the station about Stiles finally turning up in some part of town (obviously a false lead planted by Gerard or one of his cronies). He called Melissa on the way there to let her know, who in turn must have called Scott, who called the search off and decided to separate from Peter and Derek to check out the thing about Jackson. Also, more or less at that time, according to Allison, Gerard had her out to do some preparations and sent Chris on a wild goose chase in the preserve along with a couple more hunters. The moment Chris caught on, he was drugged (and would be out for a good two hours).

One more hour later, his father still couldn’t find him. He tried calling Melissa to have her on alert once more but it went straight to voicemail. At the time, Derek and Peter were researching the kanima when Lydia showed up asking for Stiles. When it was clear they couldn’t help her find him, she then tried to convince them to not kill Jackson.

At the same time more or less, Gerard stopped beating Stiles abruptly and left, presumably without detours, to find Allison and tell her it was starting. He then called Scott and threatened him to bring Derek or else. According to Peter, the teen called them to have them meet him but it sounded so forced that Peter actually tried to convince Derek something was wrong, backed, surprisingly, by Lydia. They delayed him enough for Gerard to think it was a no-show and send the kanima after them. Grandpa then tried to kill Scott and the teen fled. 

The kanima found Derek’s group halfway to the meeting spot and Lydia managed to connect with Jackson by showing him some sort of key. Derek and Peter killed him while he was distracted… only for him to come back as a blue eyed werewolf.

His father was desperate by then. He knew something was wrong but he had no leads at all and he couldn't get in contact with either Melissa or Scott. Gerard came back to his lair just as Stiles had succeeded in freeing Erica and Boyd and they had helped each other upstairs. He doesn’t know what Scott did in between fleeing and going to the Argent house (probably checked on his mom, fearing that Gerard sent the kanima after her). Allison came back too and listened to the villain speech. The rest is history.

And now they have a pack of alphas hounding them, wonderful.

(For fucks sake, dammit!)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please review :) and let me know what you think.


	8. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*
> 
> Thanks @nineofour for proofing this~ ❤

Chapter 7

“ _So, how’s France?_ ” Stiles mutters through a yawn as he rubs his eyes with his free hand.

Allison smirks at the bedhead he’s sporting and rapidly captures the image. She’s so glad she talked him out of cutting his hair because not only does she like his look but the screenshots are such good blackmail material. She would feel bad about doing this if she didn’t know he does exactly the same all the time. He did tease her about putting the picture of her with the panda facemask she put on after the plane as his phone's background, after all.

“Haven’t seen much of it yet, we’ve been cleaning the house these past two days,“ she answers ruefully and shifts in her chair enough to bring her legs up close to her chest. She lays her chin on her knees. “Dad’s the one that has gone grocery shopping and all those things. If he hadn’t brought those croissants, I’d be starting a mutiny.”

Stiles snickers at the mental image that produces and lies on his side, one arm under his head and another holding the phone in place. “ _I still can’t get over the fact that you guys own a house in France_.” Allison giggles when he yawns again and grumbles. “ _You’re looking better, though; you were like shit just two days ago._ "

“That’s what more than ten hours flying and jet lag can do to you, genius.” She smiles fondly and he mirrors it. “Don’t make me regret sending you that pic, mister.”

" _You have to admit you looked like a raccoon,_ " he mocks.

Before she can reply to that her father signals to get her attention. She takes one earphone out and makes an inquiring sound. Chris mutters something about finally going out, face surprisingly pinched for some strange reason.

“Sorry to cut this sort but we’re going out. Miss you,” she singsongs and Stiles sputters awkwardly and endearingly embarrassed. “You’re blushing? Aw, so sweet!“

“ _Miss you too, weirdo,_ ” he mutters before he hangs up abruptly, prompting an amused laugh out of her.

When she gets up from the chair and walks towards her dad, Chris looks like he’s swallowed a lemon. She blinks confused for a moment and then contains an evil smile.

—

Stiles eyes the puckered skin of his wound with a pensive expression. He’s seen the police report and the pictures the deputy took, but this is different. The gunpowder’s imprint is gone, for one, and the angry red of the inflammation has almost disappeared too. The bruising and lacerations from Gerard’s hours long loving treatment are gone too.

As always, being at the hospital makes him really uncomfortable and he can't wait to leave it. It helps that his doctor is every bit as soothing as the first day, but being honest, he'll be happier when he doesn't have to come back. That will take some time, though, because he still has to go through the rehabilitation. He tries not to dwell on it.

“The speed of your recovery is impressive, Stiles,” Dr. Mamsen remarks as he takes off the disposable gloves and earns a distracted hum from the teen.

“He’s been like that since he was a little kid,” John answers when it’s clear Stiles’ mind is elsewhere. His dad shoots him a worried look because Stiles' eyes are fixed on the gunshot wound and haven't wavered from there since he pulled his t-shirt up. “What do you think, doc?”

“If he continues at this rate, he’ll be able to start rehabilitation next week, I think. In any case, I don’t want to rush it. You still have a month until school starts, right?”

“Yeah, give or take.” Stiles snaps out of it finally and suddenly it’s like the stretcher he is reclined on is on fire with the way he starts to fidget. “Can I put my clothes on again?”

“Go for it while I update your pain prescription and I pencil you in for a, hopefully, last follow-up before rehab. Same time next week sound good?”

“Cool,” Stiles replies with a grateful smile.

John sighs when he springs from the stretcher like he’s been ejected. Neither of them like hospitals too much, but his dad is much more accustomed to covering it up than Stiles because his job has brought him back to one quite a few times since his mom died. He catches him offering an apologetic smile to the doctor for the borderline impolite behaviour of his son but the thought of rebuking him for it doesn't seem to even cross his mind, which Stiles is insanely grateful for.

“No one likes the gowns,” the doctor explains while he waves it off good-naturedly and John snorts.

“What is it?” John asks when they’re back in the car because Stiles is a little more agitated than normal and it hasn't escaped his notice. Stiles turns shiny exited eyes towards him, almost vibrating in his seat and John rolls his eyes. “Yes, son, we can stop for curly fries if your stomach feels up to it.”

Stiles sputters for a few seconds because he doesn’t know where to begin addressing that blasphemous statement. John smirks, amused at the sight and Stiles sniffs, faux offended as he fastens his seatbelt.

“I _always_ feel up to curly fries. They are the food of the gods and I’m sure that if you’d let me have them from the start…”

“You’d have been puking your guts up much sooner.”

“No, you philistine! I’d have been cured already. But I wasn’t thinking about that.” He turns to look at him again, all puppy excitement, bright eyes and big smile, like when he was a kid, when he brought back a paint bomb some big kids had been playing with at the school yard and left it in the kitchen before he went looking for him to show him his treasure. Neither of them know still how it went off. “I had an idea I’m dying to try. It may or may not involve tattoos. I’m not sure about the logistics yet.”

His dad visibly shudders but before Stiles can explain himself, his phone beeps twice in rapid succession, interrupting him. He cackles after he reads the messages.

 **From Ally:** _Lol I didn’t buy a thing :D_

Attached to it there’s a pic of Chris sporting a kill-me-please exasperated slash stoic expression that looks sneakily taken from the inside of a changing room. The man has a huge pile of clothes on his hands and looks like he would rather be in a sewer up to his ears in fecal matter and being chased by ghouls. Good girl, Stiles thinks uncharitably.

 **From Ally:** _These I did buy_.

There’s another picture of the man with his wallet in his hand, but this time a beautiful set of throwing knifes are on display. Chris' expression remains the same and Stiles is starting to suspect that is a default one.

 **To Ally:** _Nice. Didn’t know you knew how to throw knives_.

 **From Ally:** _I don’t :)_

“Son," his dad sighs,"can we go back to the part where you explain to me this thing about the tattoos, please?”

—

“It was so beautiful,” she sighs dreamily but dejected. “And the perfect color too. I don’t normally look good in that cut but with this one…”

“ _Like I believe that_.“ Stiles scoffs. He normally isn’t very into talking about fashion, but he doubts she’s very interested in hearing him rant about runes either and she actually makes an honest effort to participate in those conversations so… equal exchange and all that. ” _You’d look good in a trash bag, Ally._ “

“Don’t exaggerate.”

” _I don’t and you know I don’t say things I don’t mean,_ ” he says simply. Allison flushes but smiles at the same time pleased and embarrassed. That happens just as Chris goes to the fridge to get started preparing dinner and, just for a moment, he looks like he wants to turn around to save himself the pain. “ _Wow, just wow. I’m seeing the pic now. It really looks good on you. Why didn’t you buy it though?_ “

“I’m saving for something else,” she almost whines in answer.

“ _That’s too bad. Maybe they have an online shop available? Have you checked? That way you can try to buy it later when you save some money again._ “ In the background, she hears his laptop starting and the press of keys. ” _What was the name of the store?_ "

“Free ‘P'Star.“

“ _Okay… They do have a website but I can’t find… No, sorry, it doesn’t seem like you can buy online_.” He sounds genuinely contrite and it lifts her mood.

“That’s okay. Thanks for checking, though.”

“ _Sure. On another note, I’m officially not grounded anymore. Yay for me!_ ”

“You were grounded?” Allison asks perplexed, ignoring her father’s answering snort and muttering.

“ _Yeah, but I think it was more symbolic than anything, because the punishment was not going out, which, duh, not possible with the gunshot wound. Dad likes to pretend he’s all tough but in reality he’s a cinnamon roll._ “

Allison laughs when Stiles turns the camera to show a fondly exasperated John, who has his uniform on and looks about to leave. She waves and the man nods back all long-suffering.

“You’re incorrigible,” she snickers.

“ _I know,_ ” he cackles. “ _Miss you!_ ”

“Miss you too,” she croons and then she blows a kiss to the screen for good measure, earning a delighted laugh from him.

She takes her earphones out in time to hear her father whisking the eggs with too much force and she has to muffle a laugh. She supposes it’s sweet that he respects her enough to not interrupt even though he clearly wants to. It almost makes her feel bad about trolling him into thinking she’s talking to Scott instead of Stiles.

Almost.

—

Stiles starts practicing with the mountain ash again. He could already use it like an extra arm to grab things (that has a catch, though, as the size of the thing he can move depends on the quantity of mountain ash he uses) and now he has an idea for another possible use. He remembers how Gerard took everything when he captured him and locked it away. Of course, mountain ash is thin and he could now command it to come to him, but that takes time he might not have depending on the situation. So now he wants to make it stick to his skin in a thin layer, like a tattoo appearance wise. And it has to stay like that constantly, even asleep.

The first few tries over the course of two days look nothing like tattoos and fall the second he’s not paying attention. The next ones look like tattoos but don’t stay stuck unless he’s actively thinking about it. In the following few tries he still can’t get them to stick, but to the touch they feel like normal skin. He rakes his brain until he finds a possible solution. It works and now Stiles is the proud owner of three fake tattoos.

“What the-?!” John exclaims startled, choking on his too hot coffee. After a long coughing fit, he manages to get back his voice. “What the hell is that?!”

“Uh... I can see how this could be a problem,” Stiles chirps sheepishly, eyeing his arm where a cat is idyllically chasing some kind of fluff thing down his arm. As he’s watching it changes into swirls and travels back up until it disappears under his sleeve. The three tattoos have become one that divides and combines itself with no discernible pattern. “Mmm, I think I’ve created sentient tattoos… which, by the way, was totally not my intention.”

It takes Stiles two days more to determine that it really is sentient and that apparently there’s no way to reverse what he’s done… because it’s supposed to be impossible in the first place. He shrugs, accepts it and moves on. The moment he does the tattoos settle somewhat and start acting as if they were a mix between a dog and a cat. He shrugs again and trains it like one would a pet. It works like a charm.

(Pun totally intended that makes his dad roll his eyes and call him a dork.)

(Nothing new there.)

—

Allison’s been awake, too unsettled to sleep, for a couple of hours already when she decides to call Stiles. It’s one in the morning in California, but she knows Stiles will be awake. She puts on her earphones and keeps her voice soft so she doesn’t disturb her dad’s sleep.

“ _Have I ever told you I’m good with languages? That they come easy to me?_ ” Stiles grumbles directly, picking up just after the first ring and she's embarrassingly grateful for that.

“Hello to you too,” she drawls at the greeting. She can already feel her nerves settling just by the sound of his voice.

“ _I was totally lying_.”

“I won’t accept a statement like that from someone whom I know learned to speak Spanish almost fluently in less than a month because he was bored in a his hospital bed. And just via watching novelas and using the Internet.“ She ignores his sputters like a professional. “Is this about the Rune book again? You know there’s an Old Norse dictionary on-line, right?”

“ _That would be totally cheating and just because you’re Cheaty McCheatersen…_.”

“So it’s no good?”

“ _No,_ ” he whines mournfully. “ _It’s Proto-Norse, not Old Norse…_ “

“Wow, I can actually hear you crying from here. Nice.”

“ _You denatured bestie!_ ” Stiles cries dramatically.

Allison’s still smiling madly in happiness when Chris comes downstairs. He pauses at the sight.

“Love you too,” she croons at the screen.

Chris groans.

—

Rehab is every bit as uncomfortable as Stiles thought it would be. Flesh wound or not, it tore a lot of muscle that he now has to train back to the way it was before. The exercises are boring as hell because he has to increase the weight very gradually so as not to hurt himself again.

(He thanks all deities that Pikachu is behaving itself (What?! It shocks people! It was that or Ash… as in Ash Ketchum, but that would make Stiles the pet monster so…) and hasn’t started dancing in the face of Emily, his helper today.)

After the session, he waits for a bit sitting on a chair until his body stops shaking before going to his jeep. It took a lot to convince his father that he was well enough to drive by himself but he succeeded in the end. As they agreed, he calls him before taking off.

“ _How did it go?_ ”

“As well as can be expected, daddy-o.“ He continues before John can interrupt. ”No, really, it was okay. It just aches a bit.“

“ _Can you drive? I can come and pick you up._ ”

“I’m okay, really.” He rolls his eyes even though his dad can't see it. “I’m heading downtown to pick some things up and then I’ll get something for lunch for the both of us. How does that sound?”

“ _Sounds good… so long as not everything in that lunch is green._ ”

“I solemnly promise it will not be.”

“ _I’ll hold you to that. But, son, if you..._ ”

"Feel like it hurts too much I'll pull over and call you to pick me up. I promise, dad."

In reality he doesn’t especially need anything but to stretch his legs after being cooped up at home for too long. He wanders for a bit, window shopping, before something catches his eye as he turns the corner. Scott and Isaac are walking down the street, right ahead of him. He ducks into the coffee shop beside him without even thinking. After a tense moment, he shrugs and decides he might as well buy something seeing that he's inside already. His phone beeps.

 **From Creeperwolf:** _You’re the pinnacle of subtlety_.

Surprised, Stiles can’t resist looking around, trying to locate Peter.

 **From Creeperwolf:** _Cold_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _Seriously? Aren’t we a little bit old to be playing Hide-and-seek?_

 **From Creeperwolf:** _But it can be so fun. Out and ahead_.

Stiles snorts and pays for his order. When he leaves the store, he looks to the other side of the street and, sure enough, there’s Peter waving lazily. He wiggles his fingers back.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _What are you doing?_

 **From Creeperwolf:** _I’m on petsitting duty_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _Have fun_.

 **From Creeperwolf:** _Doubt it_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _They’re bound to do something stupid sooner or later_.

 **From Creeperwolf:** _Now that’s an interesting thought_.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _Wild guess: Derek didn’t say anything about helping them if things go south?_

 **From Creeperwolf:** _Nope_.

 **From Creeperwolf:** _One would think he’d have learned by now_.

He snorts and looks at Peter pensively before he finally makes up his mind. He crosses the street and hands the surprised man the coffee and a cinnamon muffin before going on his way to buy lunch from his father’s favorite place.

(Peter's surprised blink shouldn't be this satisfying but it is.)

—

“Of course I left bras in your drawer too! And panties for that matter,“ she fake whispers and something falls in the next room, breaking spectacularly loudly. “And that’s my drawer now, you know?”

“ _I’m just telling you to give me a heads up next time. Dad came to put some of my stuff in and nearly had an aneurysm._ ” He sounds awfully amused at the whole situation despite his words. “ _I’m almost sad he hasn’t opened your bathroom drawer and seen the treasure that’s inside,_ ” he whispers as in confidence to the camera. Allison snorts and Stiles cackles. She can hear a _not funny!_ being shouted on the other side of the line that suggests that what Stiles has described didn't happen too long ago.

“If it makes you feel better, I’ll empty a drawer for you in my room too,” she concedes merrily, earning a clearly audible sputter from her dad, who almost instantly enters the living room with an epically thunderous expression, “Stiles. It’s only fair, after all.”

“ _Pleasepleaseplease, turn around the camera!_ ” Stiles crows delightedly and Allison obliges him, capturing Chris in all his befuddled glory with her phone for her friend's viewing pleasure. She hears the tattletale distinct sound of a screenshot being taken. She grins. “ _Awesome! And deal about the drawer. See you in a few days. Love you!_ ”

“Love you too!”

She looks at her father and then inevitably loses it again. Allison lets him gape in shock for a few minutes just for the entertainment value before she takes pity on him and explains. He looks torn between wanting to throttle her and being elated that she’s not dating Scott anymore. About Stiles, he doesn’t seem to know what to think but he seems to be willing to accept her word for it and trust her judgment… or at least watch her back while she tries this new thing. He has guns and knows how to use them, his face says clearly.

“We just click, dad,” she tries to explain. “We’ve been friends for real since the hospital and half that time I’ve been here and we’ve just talked on the phone and…“

_It feels like it has been this way since forever._

Allison purses her lips as she suddenly remembers Stiles’ words before leaving about festering wounds. She’s been avoiding it, hoping to not have to be the one to bring it up and it’s obvious that her approach won’t work. She has to be the one to take the first step, she realizes, because her father will never do it with the way he keeps everything inside in a misguided way of protecting his daughter. And then it's like suddenly the dam has broken and she can’t stop talking. About Scott, about Kate, about Gerard. About her mom. She tries to make him comfortable enough to open up as well but it’s the sight of her earnest eyes that does the trick.

It’s comforting to know she’s not the only one that doesn’t like the decisions her mom made. It’s liberating to learn she’s not the only one that resents her for choosing death before life with her family. It’s consoling to find out that she’s not the only one that feels her absence left a void that will never be filled.

Above all, it’s calming (if sad) to share their immense love for her, which hasn't diminished one bit even after everything that has happened.

—

John is passing Stiles’ open bedroom door when he catches him doing what he calls the victory dance and singing _yesyesyes_. His son is in his cartoon pajamas with white gloves on his hands and a cloud of ash is continuously changing forms as it circles him like an exited pet, cracking with visible electricity. One of Stiles’ flailing arms brushes against it and he falls to the floor with a yelp and a _bad Pikachu!_ that makes the ash sag contritely. John looks heavenward, takes a sip of coffee and pointedly doesn’t ask.

—

Allison has had to leave the shop behind her to avoid giving in to the urge of smashing the shopkeeper’s face into the counter. She takes a fortifying breath before entering the fry again. They’re leaving today so he’s going to sell her _those_ books or else. With all the trouble she has gone through to locate the damn shop she's so _not_ going to leave empty-handed. _Not a fucking chance._ Now, if the aggravating shopkeeper stops feigning ignorance, _please_ , it will all go much faster.

“Now, I feel that we started off on the wrong foot,” she chirps as she smiles brightly and saccharine sweet. On the edge of her vision she sees her dad trying hard to cover a smirk and then turning to start discreetly coughing.

Allison leaves with two journals in a paper bag, a spring in her step and her whole savings gone. She is sure the bastard overpriced her but she doesn’t care. Chris shakes his head fondly.

“I hope they were worth being left financially dependant on your old man in a foreign country, even if it’s just for what remains of the day,” Chris grumbles.

“They were,” she answers simply before adding nonchalantly. “And I’ll always depend on you in some way, dad.” If Allison notices Chris eyes are suspiciously moist, she doesn’t comment on it. “Let’s go, I’m hungry. I want to try La Grenuille’s cuisine before leaving.“

“You know your mother hated that place,” he offers tentatively, which makes her pause very briefly, almost unnoticeably so. He continues as if nothing is out of the ordinary. "Or more like loathed, really."

Their talk didn’t solve everything, obviously, but it helped a great deal. Allison hopes that one day their pain will diminish enough to talk about her without it seeping into every thought they have of her.

“She did?”

“She used to say that they couldn’t cook their way out of a paper bag… and that if that was a bacheofe she was… I’d better not finish that,“ he cuts himself ruefully and she laughs.

The bacheofe turns out to be horrible all right, and they regret ever doubting Victoria in culinary matters when they almost get sick on the plane and they realize they don't have any medication for it at all. It's torture.

She calls Stiles when they land while they wait to pick up their luggage. He tries to lighten her mood and console her about the long hour taxi ride they still have to endure to actually reach home but to no avail. Thankfully they managed to get their hands on some medication before leaving the airport and it should kick in soon, making the whole experience more tolerable.

She feels warm inside when they find two Thermos filled with hot homemade chicken soup resting on their front step. There’s a sticker with a smiley inside a speaking bubble and an oddly well sketched Pikachu. Even her dad looks relieved.

It's good to be home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Some feedback, please?


	9. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*
> 
> Thanks @nineofour for proofing this chapter!

Chapter 8

Stiles is seriously considering important life choices right now.

He has sneaked into the Argent’s backyard mostly unnoticed (mostly because it seems that every neighborhood has the nosy neighbour that notices everyone and everything at any given time of the day, and that old lady hadn't lifted her eyes from Stiles for even a second) and is now contemplating the wall that has what he knows to be Allison’s window. A wall that might as well be the Yosemite Dawn Wall in terms of climbing difficulty as far as Stiles is concerned.

But he has a mighty mission and he can't let this measly obstacle stop him. He won't fail, it's just a wall, he rallies himself as he starts to hum Mission Impossible's theme. So if he grabs the… and then pushes and uses it as a lever...

Stiles braces himself and approaches the wall. He reaches to place his hands on its surface and stops abruptly, looking at the white plastic bag in his hands contemplatively. He unloops his belt until he can push the bag through its handles to rest over his butt and then he fastens it again. He heaves himself upwards.

A third into the climb, he starts to doubt the wisdom of his idea, and by the halfway point, he’s regretting his life choices completely. Nevertheless, he perseveres. Finally, he hauls himself through the window with a grunt and nearly faceplants as he trips over a box.

“Honey, I’m home,” he lets out in a rather pitiful mixture of a singsong and a wheeze, bent over his knees.

His side aches quite a bit and it's pulsing with the rhythm of his heart, so maybe it wasn’t such a great idea. But he's done it, which means he's a badass ninja too, just like Allison, and he could totally be one of those action heroes and... fucking hell, he can't stop wheezing. He takes a deep breath. Beautiful oxygen, come to papa.

(Yeah, still a BAMF.)

(Totally.)

“Stiles?” Allison’s voice comes from her bathroom. “Thank God, I couldn’t take it anymore. Bring my baby here!”

With his breath mostly back under control, Stiles starts singing raunchily, butt wiggling included, as he unfastens his belt again and approaches the bathroom. “I’ll give you what you want, what you really, really, want. I wanna hey, I wanna-” A strained sound comes from his left and he freezes, turning to look. “Ah. Hello, Mr. Argent,” he chirps cheerfully, his still undone belt in his hand. It emits a clink when he lets go of it to wave at the man.

There’s a moment of complete silence in the bathroom followed shortly by a snort and muffled laughter.

“The Midol and the tampons, please!” Allison calls out mirthfully and Stiles shrugs, dismissing the shocked man with a gun (literally) to grab the bag and pass it through a crack of the bathroom's door. “You bought a new box? I left some in the bathroom drawer.”

“Super Plus, right?” Stiles asks as he passes the belt through the loops and refastens it. "I was already on my way when you called so it was more convenient to stop to buy some instead of turning around."

“You bought tampons,” Chris states incredulously.

“Mr. Argent,” Stiles chides him in a disapproving tone, “being ashamed of buying tampons is awfully immature, you know. Menstruation is a natural part of life.” He turns to Allison when she exits the bathroom. “Which reminds me. How’s the Midol working for you?”

“Mostly fine, why?” she answers, trying to not show how funny she finds it that her father has been shocked into speechlessness.

“There was a huge line to pay so I researched a bit,” he states eagerly, wiggling in place.

“Now I’m afraid,” she deadpans.

“Prepare to marvel at my magic hands!” He tackles her, making her lie on her bed, and digs his fingers in before she can react.

“Oh. My. God,” she moans a few minutes later, face buried in the comforter after he made her turn when he finished with her stomach. Her father’s brain still hasn’t rebooted and he keeps opening his mouth as if to say something and closing it immediately after. His gun, which he had brandished when he had heard the awful racket Stiles was making while climbing, hangs limp at his side. “I’m never letting you leave this house.”

Lydia chooses that very moment to call.

—

“Are you serious? Somehow it wasn’t exactly this that I was expecting when you said you had something that would cheer us up,” Allison says, her voice dry as the desert, and looks at him incredulously. Stiles nods eagerly, bouncing in place like an excited two year old. “Okay, then, but if I end traumatized by this experience you’re going to owe me _so_ bad.” She sighs resigned as she braces herself. 

They are in the worst part of town, in front of the dingiest store she’s ever seen. Even the sign, which is in an appalling mix of lemon yellow, neon green and black dotted orange, looks only a sneeze from falling, and that’s being generous. She isn’t very impressed by the name either… especially since she can’t read it entirely because most letters are either completely missing or partially faded in the aforementioned sign.

“And if it’s good? What if this experience changes your world as you know it?” Stiles counters mischievously as they enter. She eyes her surroundings with even more skepticism and raises an eyebrow at him. At first glance everything looks so incredibly dirty that she almost recoils. At second glance, she finds that it’s just that the furniture is so old and stained that it makes it look as if it hasn’t been cleaned since the store was opened, back when the dinosaurs roamed the Earth. “You’ll be eternally grateful to me for giving you the peace of mind of knowing there’s something good in this world that’s worth fighting for,” he ends dramatically, fist in the air.

“I’ll be eternally grateful to you if I don’t expend the last day of vacation with diarrhea,” she deadpans and Stiles rolls his eyes laughing.

That the extremely little cafe is empty doesn’t inspire much trust either.

“ANA BANANAS!” he exclaims at the top of his lungs as they approach the counter, startling her.

An even older than the furniture woman appears, leaving the backroom. She’s stick thin, has her white hair in a perfect 60’s hairdo and the thickest glasses she’s ever seen rest in front of her eyes, making them ant small. She’s also stone deaf and, according to Stiles, he’s been coaxing recipes out of her ever since he was a little kid, first with shameless cuteness and later on with equally shameless emotional manipulation that she has always been completely aware of.

She’s also the grumpy cat personified and Allison would _swear_ that she hears better than she lets on, but that she enjoys watching people make a fool out of themselves way too much to correct the assumption. Whatever Stiles asks for, she mishears and ends up giving him a completely different thing and he isn’t even fazed, obviously expecting it. In the middle of it he tries to manipulate, flirt, compliment and coax a recipe out of her in equal amounts. More than the purchasing of baked goods, it looks like the mix of a cutthroat bargaining battle and the negotiation of a peace treaty. It’s so hilarious to watch that it’s making this trip absolutely worth it just on its own. At some point she even shoves a cinnamon cookie into his mouth in the middle of a phrase and he just munches delightedly with a full mouthed _Is this a new recipe? The touch of cayenne is genius!_ before continuing with what he was saying as if nothing happened.

They leave Bananas (the actual name of the cafe slash bakery) with an armful of baked goods, two coffees that smell heavenly (even though, apparently, she doesn’t sell coffee, just tea, because coffee is a disgusting sludge not fit for human consumption) and two new recipes for a cookbook she didn’t even know Stiles had. He passes her an oatmeal, banana and raisin bar that, according to Stiles, the woman apparently had sneakily put in the bag when she was making a dry remark about him being shot and being too thin. Allison hadn’t even noticed because she was too busy cackling after the woman had slapped his hand with a hot pink spatula. Twice. 

After taking a bite, Allison stops mid-step and stares at it incredulously. She looks back to the store and internally mourns her lack of financial resources at the moment, which make it impossible to buy like a few thousand bars and spend the rest of her natural life feeding on them. Stiles cackles and passes her the bag to keep. She doesn’t even give a token protest and actually eyes the rest of the bags covetously. She knows there are chocolate treasures in there and they _will_ be hers.

“Let me try that and I’ll give you something really good,” she bargains and Stiles laughs at how that sounds. 

Later, when they are in her room and she gives him a paper bag in exchange for the white chocolate and pecan cookies, he starts geeking so bad at the contents that she chokes on a mouthful laughing. He’s reclined on her bed, on his side, purely because the act has proved to be the source of an endless amount of entertainment in the form of her dad trying to be inconspicuous in his check-ups and failing horribly at it.

The mood takes an abrupt turn to the morose when she sighs and lets herself fall to lay beside him. He echoes her, laying the books in front of him, and starts tracing the cover absently with his fingers.

_Lydia’s so adamant about seeing her today that she has to cancel her plans with Stiles and can’t give him her gift. She asks Allison to pick her up because she doesn’t have her car and throughout the whole lunch and subsequent afternoon, she is in one of her bitchy moods and seems to be making an impressive attempt to bankrupt her parents through retail therapy. However, let it never be said that Allison is a bad friend, so she soldiers through it. She gets that Lydia is most likely depressed about Jackson leaving after what they went through. Allison's waiting and trying to coax her into talking to her._

When she finally speaks it’s absolutely not what she expected to hear.

_“Say what?“_

_“I took the last of my exams two weeks ago.” Lydia drops the bomb and Allison gapes. Lydia looks uncharacteristically uncomfortable but her eyes never leave Allison's. “I didn’t go to those lengths for Jackson to be stupid thousands and thousands of miles from here and get himself killed. I got confirmation from Oxford and Cambridge.” Allison is speechless at this point. “I’ve chosen Oxford and I’ve already shipped my things. I leave tomorrow,“ she finishes primly and then passes the brunette all the things she’s bought, as if to soften the blow._

_And after that, to round out the day even more, on the way back after leaving Lydia at home, a terrified deer crashes into the windshield of her car, leaving it totaled._

_Super._

“I’ll give you a ride to Lydia’s later if you want,“ Stiles offers breaking the silence, gaze still fixed on the cover where he is drumming his fingers.

“What for?” she returns, pursing her lips. “I already said my goodbyes yesterday.”

He hums and doesn’t pursue the topic. An hour later, when she changes her mind, he gets her in time to catch Lydia before she leaves. He waits leaning on the driver’s door, face carefully blank and closed off, as they tearfully say goodbye again. He doesn’t react when Lydia approaches him and awkwardly says thanks before getting into her mother’s car.

They spend the rest of the afternoon aggressively playing Black Ops at Stiles’ home and binge eating sweets until they’re almost sick. They don’t feel better by the time Chris comes to pick Allison up.

—

Stiles waits in front of the school, leaning on his jeep, for Allison to show up. He offered to pick her up, but she declined, saying her father was driving her to school today. Against his own better judgment, he’s been subconsciously looking for Scott too, but so far he hasn’t showed up, nor has Isaac for that matter. Suspiciously enough, five minutes later Scott appears on his bike at the same time as Chris’ SUV rolls into the parking lot. He glares at Stiles when Allison makes a beeline for him and ignores Scott altogether. Stiles follows her example and brushes him off too, and he can feel the glare trying to burn holes into his back.

By the time fifth period rolls around, rumors are running rampant. They are so ridiculous that he’s been in a perpetual half-giggly, half-incredulous state since the second period ended. By now, Allison has rolled her eyes so many times that it’s a miracle she hasn’t strained something. She also has had that glint in her eyes that he has learned to recognize as her plotting for mischief tell since the funny and full of endless entertainment affair that was lunch.

Stiles wouldn't have thought it possible but the rumors double in amount in the five minutes leading to English class because Scott leaves. Especially since he rushes out with another glare at Stiles and a longing look at Allison, whom doesn't even notice because she's too busy sharing an almond bar with Stiles.

“I’m sorry, Ms. Blake, but I never turn off my phone,” Stiles tells her seriously when she tells them to do exactly that.

He always keeps his phone on because of his father and he’s not going to change that for an English class. Normally he would keep it on and not say anything, but it won't work in this case.

“You will have to if you want to take this class, though,” she answers sweetly but sharply at the same time.

Before he can argue his case, something slams into the window leaving a bloody imprint. A bad feeling creeps over him and he can feel his tattoos start to move across his skin with unrest. Ms. Blake approaches the window cautiously and Stiles does exactly the opposite, for some reason remembering Allison’s deer incident. Without thinking he reaches for her and finds her doing the same. They share a wary look as they spy the black dots quickly approaching. They pull each other towards the exit as the rest of the class approaches the windows curiously, but they never make it. Birds dive and slam into the windows and then into the students when they break in a shower of crystal. Students scream and bat at the birds. Stiles pulls on Allison, Allison pulls on Stiles, and they make it to the teacher's desk and crawl under it for cover.

“ _Stiles? Stiles!_ ” A voice finally penetrates his mind, when all the birds lie dead over the classroom. At Allison’s wild eyed look, he recalls the ash back, praying no one noticed it. Some teachers rush in, having heard the commotion. “ _Stiles!_ ”

He eyes his phone, breathing harsh and heart pounding wildly. He still has Allison under his arm, his hand covering her head protectively and her hands are fisting her own jacket, which she had used to cover them both, in a white knuckled grip. He distantly remembers hearing the phone ringing but doesn’t recollect taking the call at all.

“Peter?”

A moment later, there’s a ringing in his ears and he can’t breathe. Allison presses a bag into his hand and he tries to control his panic attack. No, he doesn’t have time for this now, he has to get to the hospital. His father is hurt.

The moment he has himself more or less under control, he gets up to head to his jeep. Ms. Blake stops them and when he tries to explain that he has to get to the hospital _now_ , she says she can’t let them drive in shock, that that’s an accident waiting to happen. He ignores her and tries to leave anyway. Allison follows him, both of their bags in her hands. When the woman actually steals his car keys from his hands, right there in the parking lot, Stiles is ready to commit murder. He snarls at her and she recoils aghast. Coach Finstock, of all people, steps in, taking the keys from her hand before she can even register his presence.

“Bilinski! Get in the car,” he bellows signaling to his own car before turning to Allison. “You too, but just because I know you’ll follow and I don’t want to deal with the problem of explaining to your father why they have to unstick you from the asphalt with a spatula.”

Stiles' never been more grateful to that asshole of a man as he is now. Finstock gets them to the hospital in record time and harasses the nurse until she gives them the information they need. Stiles almost sags with the relief he feels when he learns of his dad’s condition. Allison's arm is firmly hooked around his own and normally Stiles would recoil at the contact in a situation like this, but it feels wonderfully grounding.

They reach the waiting room and Peter is there, silently snarling at Derek, Isaac, Scott and Melissa. When Stiles spies the blood on the man’s clothes, it’s as if time stops and then, when it restarts, everything goes in slow motion.

“Thanks, Coach, I can take it from here,” he says, hearing his own voice as if it’s coming from underwater.

“You sure, Bilinski?”

“Yeah, I’m not alone. Thanks for driving me here.”

The man finally leaves after a moment of hesitation. He tosses the teen the keys to his jeep as he turns and Allison is the one to catch them when Stiles misses them. He accepts them from her with a thanks and pockets them. Stiles waits until he can’t see Finstock anymore before finally talking, his voice so cold that it burns.

“ _What. The. Hell. Happened._ ”

Derek frowns, Melissa and Isaac honest to god flinch and Scott recoils. None of them make to speak. Peter starts to explain but Derek interrupts with some bullshit about humans and danger. Allison bristles in fury and after checking there’s no one else in the waiting room, she tasers him into kingdom come. Peter looks reluctantly impressed. Everything descends into chaos and Stiles finally reaches his limit. He yells.

He gets his explanation.

The alpha pack are definitely a threat. They have Erica and Boyd and they nearly got Isaac, who escaped thanks to some mystery woman. In the middle of their escape they crossed his father, who was on duty investigating some calls about disturbances. He helped them get to the hospital. That was very early this morning.

Apparently, wounds made by alphas take time to heal, and that’s why Isaac got admitted. He asked to call for Derek, who didn’t answer his phone because he has lost it (Peter's face doesn't even twitch) and hasn’t bothered replacing it yet. Isaac also asked for Scott, but Melissa didn’t want to distract him and it took a while before she relented. This gave the alpha pack enough time to infiltrate the hospital to try to abduct Isaac and the mystery woman again, whom, by the way, has disappeared and not been seen ever since. His father caught them in the act and the only reason he wasn’t killed was because Derek and Peter appeared to save the day. Scott arrived in time to catch the tail end of it and prevent a second alpha from taking a drugged up Isaac with the help of Derek, while Peter gave his father first aid until the nurses and doctors rushed in.

When the explanation is done, Stiles has a moment in which his body and mind want to act in a million different ways. He wants to _ragecryscreamhurtkill_. His breath gets caught for a second before he deflates, suddenly exhausted. He sags in the chair beside Peter and Allison copies him, taking his hand.

 _Dad has only a flesh wound and a concussion, the only reason there’s so much blood is because they grazed his scalp_ , he has to remind himself before he panics one more time. The urge to do something drastic assaults him again with vengeance. Heart in his throat, he settles for squeezing Peter’s knee and Allison’s hand, and kicking everybody else out via implacably cutting barbs. Peter looks fascinated by his abrasive invective and Allison’s lips twitch despite the situation.

“Thanks for calling me,” he chokes out, settling a cold stare on Melissa as she leaves, which makes her flinch, “and for helping my father. That’s three, I suppose.”

“You get a discount just this once for being such a loyal customer. And because that cinnamon muffin was fantastic.” A strangled half-laugh, half-sob escapes Stiles. “Ah, before I forget, hang your phone up, sweetheart.”

“What?” he asks confused, his voice a little tremulous.

“Your phone. You never hung up.”

He fishes out the phone from his back pocket and, sure enough, the call is still active at thirty-four minutes, forty seconds and counting. He bites his lip, feeling ridiculously grateful about what Peter not ending the call implies, and hangs up.

He squeezes the man's knee again, takes a deep breath and waits for the permission to go to see his father.

(He's alive and just a little banged up, he reminds himself again.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Some feedback, please?


	10. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*
> 
> This dragged its feet so much TT~TT I was very frustrated.
> 
> Proofed by @nineofour~

Chapter 9

Contrary to popular belief, Stiles is not an oblivious and clumsy spaz. Okay, yeah, clumsy, he is, he’ll concede that. This morning he tripped in the bathroom over his own two feet and nearly choked on his toothbrush (and it's not the first time this has ever happened, so he can't blame it on his still healing body) and if that isn't the definition of clumsy, he doesn't know what it may be. So sure, clumsy equals Stiles. Accepted. Spaz? When his ADHD is being a bitch or he deliberately acts like that yeah, sure. But oblivious? Not a chance in hell. 

And, to be honest, Peter is laying it on thick enough to easily choke on it.

Now… what to do, what to do… Does he let things run their course to see if Peter slips and he can, at the very least, get a glimpse of his true intentions? Or is taking a direct approach the better course of action?

Absently, Stiles traces the cover of the encrypted tome Peter lent him and eyes his glove covered hand. Its white contrasts sharply against the deep maroon of the book, even in the deteriorated corners, where the color has faded into a dark burgundy instead. He drums his fingers once and purses his lips, sighing. He raises his eyes and his gaze fixes on the clock subconsciously. 03:47.

Silent as a ghost, he pads barefooted through the shadowy hallway to his dad’s bedroom and pokes his head into it to check on him. It’s still too soon to wake him up again, but he can’t help himself. He _has_ to check on him, to see the soft rising and falling of his chest. The teen studies his father's form carefully for any cause for alarm, but other that being still a little pale, nothing seems to have changed in his condition since Stiles woke him up last. He draws in a shuddering breath, his relief almost making him shake.

He turns around to go back to his own room and wait. He himself hasn’t even tried sleeping, even though he told his dad he would. He’s too high-strung to even consider trying, and more than a little jittery with nerves in addition to that.

Before leaving the hospital, his dad had tried arguing about Stiles getting up every hour to wake him up, saying that he would set an alarm, that he was fine. Stiles had been adamant, it was either that or remain in the hospital. It was a close call, but the man hates hospitals as much as Stiles does (or maybe his son's pale and pinched face had given away that Stiles wouldn't have slept even if he had remained at the hospital), so he chose to go home. Stiles had to drive his dad's cruiser back because his jeep was still at school. In other circumstances he would have cracked a joke about it to make the situation less tense, but just seeing his father’s exhausted form in the passenger seat had been more than deterrent enough.

Unexpectedly, he finds himself smiling fondly. Allison and Peter had left the hospital almost two hours before he could. Allison must have filched his car keys from his back pocket before leaving with her dad, because when he had pulled into the driveway his jeep was there. He found said keys on his room’s desk, one pan full of mac and cheese in the kitchen and the last two peanut butter cookies gone. A sticker with a heart, a _hehehe xoxo_ and a winking emoji was attached to the paper bag.

Since she doesn’t have house keys and she didn’t pickpocket those from Stiles, he’s a hundred percent sure that she lockpicked the door. His lips twitch. Ninja princess, indeed.

Stiles sighs, smile fading. He might as well get some work done while he’s at it. He places the tome in the protective bag Peter brought it in, takes off the gloves and reaches for Allison’s rune journal, losing himself in it bare minutes after.

The alarm rings, making him jump startled. His heart skips a beat and his breath catches. Even though it's been less than fifteen minutes since he last saw his dad, he hurries down the hallway, heart in his throat. His dread is soothed when his dad wakes up without much prompting.

Ten minutes later he can't help himself again and he finds himself at his dad's door, peering inside the room. He studies the big black bruise adorning his father’s cheek and the bandages covering a too close of a call wound. He didn’t want to get involved in any more supernatural bullshit, but the moment they attacked his father, they signed their death sentence.

_Stiles’ going to tear them to shreds._

But first he has to know their faces, how many they are and everything about them. He goes back to his room, takes out his phone and mulls over how exactly he wants to proceed for just a moment. Then, he fires out an email and waits.

About five minutes later, he rises from his seat and pads down the hallway once again. Up and down goes his father's chest but he has to resist the temptation to call his name. He turns around reluctantly.

It’s an exhausting rinse and repeat for the rest of the night, but hearing his father’s cranky grumbles instead of silence makes it more than worth it. He says _I love you_ every single time.

—

Stiles sighs blearily as he drives. Apparently, another kid is missing apart from Boyd and Erica so, against his better judgment, he’s left his father at the station after extracting a promise out of him to keep to desk jobs all day. For good measure, he’s sacrificed his last provisions from Bananas to bribe Tara into keeping an eye on him all day (which in all fairness, she would have done anyway, cookies or no cookies). When he stops in front of Allison’s, his face must be epic because she takes a look at it and pushes him to sit on the passenger’s seat. 

“Did you ask your father?” he murmurs as she pulls off the drive, eyes closed and forehead resting on the window.

“Yeah, and he tried to sell me the retired thing,” she snorts as she starts driving slowly, trying to get a feel for the keep because it's quite different from driving her own car.

“Bullshit.“

“Exactly.” They share an unimpressed look. “It took me half an hour to make him crack.”

“Which means he only told you half of it,” he clarifies, the corner of his mouth twitching.

“Yeah,” she sighs. “He’s following the lead of something but he says he doesn’t have anything concrete.”

“Mmhm…” Stiles hums skeptically.

“He did tell me that, whatever he’s investigating, it doesn’t have anything to do with the alpha pack, though and I may be wrong, but I didn't feel like he was lying to me or telling me a half-truth.”

“About that. My father talked to Deaton before everything started going to shit.” He turns to look out through the window as if searching, but the light feels too intense for his tired eyes and he has to close them when they start watering in protest. “It’s them. The reason the animals are acting all crazy is their presence.”

“But can we really trust any information coming from him?”

“That’s pretty much what I thought," he nods in agreement. "The man’s shady as fuck and I don’t trust him as far as I can throw him. But, to be honest, it actually makes sense if you really think about it.”

“Mmmm… I suppose so,” she agrees hesitantly after a moment. “Has Peter told you anything else about recovering Isaac’s memories?“

“They tried doing some werewolf mojo and it failed, so they’ll go to Deaton’s later.”

“Him again," she scoffs. "Why do I get the feeling that he knows way more than he lets on?”

“Shady as fuck, I tell you.”

Stiles sighs relieved when he opens his eyes again and finds that she has stopped for coffee before reaching the school. He feels so grateful, in fact, that he even leans over to smack a kiss on her cheek theatrically with a moaned _you’re my hero_. Allison grins, cheeks pink, and drags him to the entrance. Stiles makes a protesting sound at having to get up from his seat but he has to admit that moving as fresh air hits his face feels wonderful.

He’s near the entrance waiting for her, almost nodding off and starting to tilt dangerously on his seat, when someone approaches him.

“Stiles? Oh my God, it’s really you!” 

It takes a second for his sludgy brain to fire up and connect her face to a name and a memory. One embarrassing picture full of nakedness, three year old toddlers and neon pink plastic pools assaults his mind with prejudice.

“Heather?”

“Yeah!” she exclaims delighted at being recognized and tackles him into a hug. He pats her back awkwardly and, over her shoulder, he sees some of her friends giggling and seemingly waiting for her near the door. “It’s been a while! How have you been?” The barista chooses that moment to call out _Luke Skywalker_ and _Princess Leia_ and he breaks into snickers. “That’s yours, I suppose?” Heather giggles and he grins at her.

“Yeah. So, how have you been?” he asks, dodging her own question, as he spies Allison coming near.

He makes grabby hands at her and Heather makes a curious sound and peers around. When she doesn't spot anyone she recognizes in particular among all the people currently at the coffee shop, she seemingly shrugs it off and goes on excitedly.

“Cool! I’m having my birthday party the weekend after this one. It’s going to be epic!”

“That sounds awesome,” he agrees with a distracted smile, his attention on the treasure Allison is carrying. Caffeine, he almost moans.

He turns towards the brunette completely as she reaches him and nearly misses the strange expression on Heather's face when he gives Allison a one-armed hug before stealing a coffee from the cup holder and taking a sip. Before he can introduce them, Heather starts excusing herself.

“Well, I should be going or I’m gonna be late.” She gives him another hug. “You’re invited to the party if you’re up to some fun,” she adds as she starts going to her friends' side.

Stiles waves at her goodbye, bemused at the rather abrupt departure. He eyes Allison’s amused smile thoughtfully and looks at Heather’s rapidly retreating form. He blinks.

“One,” he lifts a finger, wiggling it in her face, “why do I feel like I missed something? And two,“ he adds another, “you, my lady, get entirely too much amusement out of trolling people. I approve completely,“ he adds faux seriously and tackles her, letting his body weight push her down. Allison laughs breathlessly as she tries to save her cup from meeting its sorry end. ”Where have you been all my life?“ he sings.

When they are about to leave, he stops abruptly and looks back thoughtfully to the coffee machine and the barista. Allison looks at him quizzically when he goes back but his smirk cuts any question she could have had.

—

Stiles calls his father before entering the school. Then, not bothering with subtlety, he calls Tara too to confirm. 

“ _Your father, you know, my boss, wants me to tell you that he’s the father in this relationship,_ ” Tara relays the message to him, entirely amused.

“Duh. And I’m the son,” he quips flippantly. “Tell him to stop pointing out the obvious and that if he leaves that desk for anything other than going to the toilet, I’m going to have him eating brussel sprouts for the rest of his natural life. Better yet, Tara, if you put a catheter on him I’ll get you a lifetime supply of the Choc&Choc monster cookies you like.”

Tara’s only response to that before hanging up is laughter. He looks at his phone with a pout, contemplating calling again but before he can actually dial, Allison grabs his hand with a roll of her eyes and pulls him to class.

They spend the entire period trying not to cackle as Coach Finstock (after an initial _sonofa!_ when he scalds his tongue with his coffee) wastes it talking, quoting and ultimately relating what little economics he teaches to Independence Day, a cup with Captain Steven Hiller written on it in his hand. Allison humors Stiles and high fives him when he puts his hand up.

—

“Out of town? What about your injuries?” Stiles protests worried, heart starting to climb towards his throat. “Dad, you’ve just had a concussion.”

“ _Which is why I’m bringing Collins with me,_ ” his dad cajoles. “ _Something came up about one of the open cases and we have to go check it out. And you know we are short-staffed now so… I like it as much as you do, son. If I could, I wouldn’t go myself._ ”

Damn Matt Daehler to hell and back. 

“When will you be back?” Stiles asks, trying to stop bouncing his leg.

“ _We’re leaving in an hour, so a day at most. It’s just a routine witness interrogation. The only reason it’s going to take a day is precisely because we’re going to take it easy on our way there and back._ "

“You better, okay?” Stiles grumbles. “The threat about the brussel sprouts wasn't a joke and still stands.”

" _And I promise you I'll take it with the gravity it warrants,_ " his dad answers seriously, prompting a snort out of Stiles.

—

Stiles lays his forehead on his bag, grumbling when Allison tries to coax him into eating something. After the caffeine has run its course out of his system, he has crashed badly. His mind is all over the place but at the same time he feels like he’s about to conk out in the next few seconds. If he could just... He jumps in his seat when a lunch tray is placed in front of him, right beside Allison.

“Dude,” he reproaches and the teen shrugs. 

“You realize that if Lydia hadn’t asked me to, I wouldn’t be doing this for free, right? Or at all,” Danny grumbles, his face tight as if he has pulled an allnighter. Stiles perks, opening his mouth, and Danny raises a hand, stalling him. The goalie shoots him a look that says _I don’t want to know what this is about, ok? Plausible deniability and all that._ Aloud, he only adds, “I’m not a waiter, you know? I have better things to do than to bring you coffee.”

“You’re the best, Danny, a jewel in between mere rocks,” Stiles crows happily, both because of the coffee and the memory stick tapped under the cup. “Truly a gift to the gay world, girls all over the planet are crying.” Allison sticks some fries in his mouth to shut him up and Danny snorts. He just charges on, mouth half full. “See? She doesn’t want me to reveal to you her immeasurable pain!“

“I’m mourning,” she deadpans monotonously. "Oh so heartbroken. Why didn’t you tell me you were gay?” She grins and Danny rolls his eyes, amused.

“Sorry you lost class because of that, though,” Stiles adds truthfully.

“Who says I lost class?” Danny arches a brow impishly. “Where did you get that information? Nothing like that shows on my record,” he adds, making Stiles and Allison cackle.

—

Stiles ponders what to do with his newfound knowledge as Allison looks pensively at the laptop’s screen. They have made a cold dinner of assorted sandwiches, which she has been tricking him into eating ever since they started researching.

Five. Five alphas. Two of them the new twin students at Beacon Hills High. He recalls Danny shooting interested looks at one of them and he fires him a text about having new info and, bottom line, to not touch that with a ten foot pole. Danny answers with a sarcastic _why am I surprised with my track record?_ followed by a _thanks_. 

Thanks to the hospital’s security feed and to Danny running a facial recognition program, they have almost everything they need. There are five alphas that have Erica, Boyd and another unidentified girl captive in an abandoned bank vault on the outskirts of town. Stiles ponders about it and then grabs his phone.

 **To Danny:** _How difficult would it be to check if the bank’s security cameras still work? Unnoticed, of course._

 **From Danny:** _I don’t wanna know why would you want that._

 **From Danny:** _First check if there’s electricity, turn them on, hack them. But if they are old, they might have a red light when active._

 **From Danny:** _Also, when turning the electricity on, other devices might turn on too._

 **To Danny:** _Thanks._

“Wasn’t there a robbery in that bank years ago?” Allison asks, resting her head on his shoulder and stuffing a bite of the sandwich in her mouth before making him do the same.

“I like the way you think, my awesome ninja princess,” he croons as he gets up to grab his car keys. “Wanna make a little trip?”

They’re back before an hour, having filched every paper at the police station about the robbery. Stiles has a moment of remorse for doing it but resolves to tell his dad about it when he's back. He studies the files carefully and, perfect, all the information they need about the security camera is on them. He fires it to Danny.

Turns out that model doesn't have the telltale red light and also, that the alphas have turned the electricity back on themselves to have some amenities. He grins evilly, echoed by Allison.

Danny is awesome and Stiles _has_ to find a way to make it up to him because he hacks Stiles’ laptop to install everything he needs on it remotely. They have the security feed of the inside _and_ the outside of the vault running on his laptop in under half an hour.

—

“I don’t even know why I am surprised.” Peter muses absently as he looks at the security feed. “We got the information out of curly, but not even near this much. The dumb alliance’s still scratching their heads about how to proceed.” Stiles snorts at the name and Peter smirks.

It’s late, Allison left about an hour ago when Chris came to pick her up. His father called to talk to him for a little bit too. Peter, as always, came through the window not even a minute after firing him a text. 

“What do you want from me, Peter?” he asks plainly, reclining in his seat.

“Is there a way to put this program in my own laptop? Because I doubt you’ll be willing to part with yours,“ the man inquires, not taking his eyes from the screen. 

“I know that dumb is catching, but I thought you above that,” he tosses sharply and the man turns to look at him. Stiles’ always been fond of preemptive strikes and of nipping the problem at the bud and it's the approach he's decided to take on this. “You know what I’m talking about.”

“What I want,” Peter intones slowly, placing his hands on the armrests on both sides of Stiles and turning him until his back is to the laptop. Stiles forces himself to remain still. “I want loyalty. I want companionship from someone who is not a simpleton.“ _Or is trying to think ways of getting rid of him or treating him like he’s expendable, a pawn to be sacrificed_ , he doesn't say, but Stiles can fill in the blanks. “I want pack. I want you.“

“Oh, is that all?” Stiles answers as if unimpressed, eyebrow raised and arms crossed. He knows the man can hear his accelerated heartbeat and that it's giving him away but he continues as if the man's words haven't sent his heart into overdrive. "Nothing else?"

“Well, I’d love to have my identity back and to not have to live in the wild.” Stiles sputters, shocked. “I also want" he raises his eyes up and blanches, facepalming,” to know what I did in another life to deserve such a stupid nephew.”

Stiles turns in his seat abruptly. On the screen, Derek, Isaac and Scott are exiting the Camaro about three streets before the bank. The vault has mysteriously been vacated in the last few minutes he’s been talking to Peter, except for the captives themselves. It has trap written all over it. In neon bright flashing letters. With sonorous effects.

He jumps towards his phone and tries calling Scott, but he can see him clearly ignoring the call in the feed. He tries again with the same results.

“Sonofa!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Some feedback, please?


	11. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*
> 
> Thanks @nineofour for proofing this~

Chapter 10

“ _Skurwiel!_ “ Stiles curses loudly as he shoots from his chair. 

He runs to the closet, where he keeps his emergency stash of mountain ash. Some leaks out from the bag in his hurry, making Peter back off hastily, but the teen calls it before it can reach him. Without a word, Peter follows him downstairs and then towards the jeep, and Stiles frowns, filing that little detail for later. He hits speed dial as he climbs into the car. Scott hangs again.

“Skurwysyn!” he snarls through clenched teeth and hits another speed dial.

Stiles is halfway to the bank, Peter a silent presence on the passenger’s seat, when he starts questioning his own actions. Why the hell is he even doing this? Why is he rushing to the rescue? Just like with Jackson back in second grade, he doesn’t have a clue.

It’s not a secret that Stiles and Jackson have never been friends. In fact, their relationship has never ever even encroached the territory of tolerance, let alone cordiality. Stiles has always liked to say that he could spot the asshole in Jackson even in kindergarten. Scott always rolled his eyes at that one and accused him of exaggerating.

He sure as hell isn't exaggerating but it's true that they haven't always been so openly hostile towards each other. Back then, they used to try to stay out of each other’s ways at the very least. Oh, they clashed, of course, because Stiles, even before his mother’s decline, was never one to cater to anyone’s whims, and Jackson never took it well when things didn’t go his way.

And then _The Event_ happened.

Ms. Marple, their teacher from second grade, still gives Stiles narrow-eyed looks over the rim of her glasses whenever they cross paths. No matter where they bump into each other, she will actually stop whatever she's doing to stare fixedly at Stiles and monitor what he's up to. She’s, what, like eighty years old now? And it's been almost ten years too! It was _that_ bad.

As for Aaron McKinney, he still crosses the street when he spots Stiles or, if he can’t do that, he averts his eyes. Or if he hasn't noticed him and suddenly he raises his eyes and finds Stiles there, he will visibly flinch and subconsciously his eyes will look for an escape very obviously. It was _that_ bad.

So the thing is that back then Aaron used to be a bully of the worst kind. He continuously went after the younger years and tormented them while the teachers turned a blind eye. One day, oh lil’ Jackson and Stiles were in the middle of one of their clashes, when the older boy went after Jackson because, quote, his whiny baby voice was pissing him off. When Jackson went down, Stiles reacted without thinking.

They had to take the three of them to the hospital that day. Aaron with a bad concussion and a broken leg, Stiles with a broken wrist and Jackson with a nearly shut closed black eye and with what they thought was a broken nose but wasn’t in the end.

Stiles’ father still uses the _his face broke my wrist_ as a private joke at the station. Anderson, his dad’s partner at the time and now retired from the force, still cracks up every single time, just like the very first day Stiles chirped it at the hospital when Aaron’s father tried to pin all the blame on him. Rookies never get the myriad of puns it has generated over the years.

Jackson took offense upon being called the rescued princess in the situation by a classmate and tried to convey his displeasure to Stiles by stealing his best friend’s inhaler. Stiles took offense to that and made him regret it. Jackson’s nose ended up well and truly broken among other things and Stiles sprained the wrist that wasn't broken as well as earning himself a black eye. The feud of The Offended is a vicious circle still going strong nowadays.

But back to what's important about the story, to this day, he still doesn’t know why he rushed to Jackson’s rescue in the first place. And it seems that Stiles hasn't changed much in all these years, because he doesn't know why he's doing the same with the Dumb Alliance right now either.

Derek is a dick with a lot of baggage and self loathing that he inflicts on others as much as on himself; Isaac is following in his alpha’s footsteps nicely in terms of attitude and shitton of unresolved issues (plus the unwillingness to work on them); Scott has obviously cut his ties and moved on to the sunset of denial, self-assuredness and many other things that start with self; and don’t get him started on Boyd and Erica, both of whom left him to die, or that mystery woman he doesn’t know or care about. So why?

Everyone he cares for, directly or indirectly (because, admittedly, he doesn’t care about papa Argent at the moment beyond his association to Ally’s continued happiness), was safe and secure before he convened the cavalry. So why the hell? He doesn’t owe them a thing! Right now he has nothing to gain and everything to lose because the alphas aren’t inside the vault anymore, so he won’t even be eliminating a present threat or ensuring their safety down the road in any way. It’s utterly and irrevocably pointless.

Damn Scott for not picking up the fucking phone. Damn himself because he knows he would have if the situations were reversed. Because he’s smart enough to recognize that, with the situation as it is between them, he would only call in case of an emergency. Damn him because he still cares.

It’s obvious Scott doesn’t. And it wouldn’t be the first time he doesn’t pick up his phone when Stiles needs him to, to be honest. He hates to even consider it, but maybe that’s a sign of him having never really cared beyond the quid pro quo? And now that he has outlived his usefulness… He shakes his head. He doubts Scott is that calculating, it’s probably more a case of him being a self-centered shit and abusing their friendship… and Stiles being too stupidly loyal.

He hates himself quite a bit at the moment for letting Scott have that on him anyway. What was the saying? Fool him once, shame on them; fool him twice…

He should really step on the brakes and turn around.

He curses in polish and steps on the gas instead, turning to take a secondary street because he has known the police patrol’s schedule like the back of his hand since even before he hit thirteen and, rescue or not, he's not going to get caught speeding well beyond the limit and bring more filth onto his dad's reputation.

He curses again. His fury has been rising with every passing minute and his tattoos are swirling on his skin, matching his mood. Peter is eyeing him and the swirling ash with a mixture of fascination and hunger, Stiles’ laptop closed on his lap. The feed went dark the moment Derek and company entered the bank about two minutes ago, rendering their only advantage useless, so the alphas must have cut the electricity.

They screech to a halt in front of the bank almost at the same time as Allison’s exiting her father’s SUV. Chris nods at Stiles darkly as he takes his gun out, already looking around for any immediate threat. Maybe he’s still smarting from the verbal flaying Stiles gave him when the man tried the retired bullshit again but Stiles doesn't really give a damn about the man's sensibilities. Peter, who was privy to the entire conversation, smirks at his side and Chris cocks his gun pointedly. Stiles wants to roll his eyes badly at the posturing.

When Allison takes the taser out to strap it to her waist, Chris takes it from her hands, ignoring her protests, and replaces it with another one. “Use this one,” he says gruffly. “It has more voltage than yours so don’t use it on a human unless you intend to kill, okay?”

“Really?” she inquires looking at it skeptically. It looks identical to the other one. “How much more?”

“More,” Chris deadpans.

“Eloquent,” Peter sniffs.

“You want me to elaborate? It works wonders with mutts, keeping them from transforming. If they are weakened it may even kill them. I'm open to doing demonstrations, if you're the type that needs visual expositions,” Chris insinuates with a sharp smile, eyes fixed on him.

Peter flashes him his fangs, opening his mouth to retaliate with something that will probably flay the hunter alive verbally and Stiles intervenes before things degenerate. He gets in the middle, facing Chris and with one hand on Peter’s chest.

“Oookay," he drags the word as he nods towards the entrance. "Let's move on the show, shall we? You can have your slumber party and declare your mutual love later.”

Stiles sends his ash through the cracks around the door first, just in case, even though Peter had been controlling the feed on the laptop the whole way in the car until it went dark and there was no sign of the alphas minutes ago. Peter doesn't detect any fresh scent (only lingering ones) or noise coming from the inside, but since Derek, Scott and everyone else is supposedly inside and he can't hear them either, it's not a reliable indicator.

Stiles tells him to keep paying attention anyway as he pushes on the door. Besides what little light comes from the outside, the bank is in complete darkness. Stiles has come prepared, though, so he turns on his flashlight, copied by Chris and Allison. They scope out the first floor quickly before advancing inside silently. It looks deserted, but Stiles expected that because they kept Erica, Boyd and the mystery girl in the vault below.

Stiles is the one that has been watching the feed the most, so he guides them towards the access to stairs that lead to the vault's floor. They provide cover for each other as they quickly cross through the darkened first floor. Nothing much remains save for the furniture but it's enough that anyone could use it as a hiding spot, so Stiles tries to direct his ash there as they advance. It's nerve-wracking but they make it to the door and the stairs without a hitch.

The vault's floor is definitely soundproofed like the files said, because the moment they open the door after the stairs, they get assaulted by the snarls and the sounds of a fight. A thundering crash echoes and they rush to the vault with Chris still covering their backs.

The vault is a little lighter but not by much, and what they can glimpse under the moonlight and the flashlights is horrible. Chris aims but Stiles stops him, backed by Allison. It would be almost impossible to tell them apart even under the proper lighting because everyone is wolfed out and moving at impossible speeds. They are even in number, but even at first glance Stiles can tell that Derek, Isaac and Scott are pulling their punches while their opponents are going for the kill, crazed out of their minds. A lot of blood is sprayed everywhere on the ground and covering them. Stiles shudders when his sneakered feet almost slip on it and only a timely catch from Peter saves him.

Stiles stops Allison and Peter with a hand in the air as he steps on something. He forcefully pulls Chris back, out of the way of a swiping claw and outside of the mountain ash line he’s found keeping them all together inside the vault. He ignores the man's snipped protests and studies the situation hastily, his mind going a mile a minute. There’s no way he can use it to trap the feral wolves, they’re moving faster than he can direct the ash to move at and he can’t even see properly. And if they shoot they’ll have the same problem. He suddenly gets an idea and whistles loudly. When shifted, a werewolf’s hearing capacity doubles after all.

“Get away from them!” he shouts when the action seems to halt momentarily. He empties his bag of mountain ash, commanding it to start spreading over the vault. “Push them together!”

“Get the hell out, Stiles!” Scott roars, fending off Erica.

Derek doesn’t even bother responding and keeps on fighting the mystery woman. He grabs her and tries to immobilize her against the wall. She snarls and pushes against him, sending him flying and into Scott, who manages to disentangle from him just in time to avoid Erica's claws to the face.

“Genius idea! Hadn’t thought of it!” Isaac snarks as he swipes at Boyd. He gets pushed to the ground and manages to roll away by a hair's breadth.

“Don’t be stupid, do as he says!” Allison shouts, getting his idea almost instantly. “Push them under the moonlight so he can see!”

“You brought Allison?!” Scott yells, getting distracted. Erica rakes her nails over his arm and he screams in pain. He grabs her and throws her against the wall. She snarls in pain and charges again.

Something snaps in Stiles at that and his temper ignites again. Well, let it not be said he didn’t try. And it’s not like it’s going to kill them in any case.

Probably not.

Okay, possibly not.

He mentally shrugs and stops Chris another time from taking a shot. He ignores the man’s menacing scowl and stops Peter from getting into it with the hunter too. Might as well get something out of this mess, he thinks. He’s been waiting for this epic pun since _forever_ , after all, and what better moment than this? He just has to concentrate on keeping the amps controlled... He makes the ash of his own tattoos join the one in the air.

“Pikachu, thunder!” he crows almost vindictively when it's in place.

The vault lightens abruptly. They can’t even scream, it’s all very anticlimactic. The light is gone almost as fast as it came and they drop like sacks of potatoes where they stand, twitching pitifully on the ground.

Chris gapes, arms going lax to his sides; Allison eyes her bow and throwing knifes mournfully and, resigned, comments about the beautiful silvery blue the electricity had taken this time instead of the normal golden one; and Peter laughs his ass off delightedly at the slight smell of burned hair that permeates the air.

They end up having to call Deaton for medical assistance because Stiles still needs more practice and may have overdone it a little. Stiles doesn’t trust him, so he doesn’t tell him exactly how the situation they are in came to be, but he gets the feeling the druid knows anyway. He doesn’t like the way the man looks at him. Peter, Allison and, strangely, Chris seem to concur, because they don’t leave his side.

Peter can’t keep his eyes from the formerly mysterious woman, now the previously thought dead Cora Hale.

—

Later, after they finally get to Deaton's clinic, they settle in to wait for the werewolves to regain consciousness. Sitting on a chair feels like the best thing any of them has done in hours.

“If another hunter was in town,” Stiles mutters softly when Deaton finally leaves to rest for a bit, “would they tell you?”

“It’s the thing to do in another hunter’s territory,” Chris answers tiredly. It’s almost six in the morning they are still awake. “But it’s not always a sure thing,” he finally admits after a skeptical look from Stiles. “Why?”

“The mountain ash line.”

“I thought that was yours?” Allison asks through a yawn, making Stiles yawn too.

"I added mine to zap them all," Stiles explains as he shakes his head, "but there was already a line there keeping them trapped inside the vault."

“There’s someone else involved in this,” Chris sighs, tapping his fingers against his knee.

“Exactly,” Stiles nods, leaning back on his chair and trying to work out a kink in his neck.

“Rogue or not, no hunter would work with the likes of the alpha pack,” Chris points out frowning.

“More like the alpha pack would never work with hunters after what your daddy dearest did to their leader,“ Peter interjects snidely.

Stiles rubs his face and shares an exasperated look with Allison as they go at it again. None of the werewolves has even stirred yet, it's going to be a long wait. Both sigh in unison.

—

“Hi, dad!” Stiles chirps tiredly when he takes his father’s videocall, hours later but still painfully awake.

“ _Your school called,_ ” John says as a greeting. “ _I told them you weren’t there because you had pulled your wound. Tell me it’s not actually that and that you’re just skipping so I can ground you and move on?_ “ he finishes drolly but with an edge of worry. He seems to be in some kind of diner having breakfast with Collins, if the decor and the other man’s audible snickers at his dad’s words are anything to go by. His father looks at Stiles' face closely and then turns to look to his right.“ _Get me another coffee, will you? I think I’m going to need it.“_

“I didn’t pull the wound and I’m skipping,” Stiles answers dutifully, lips twitching.

“ _Stiles…_ “

“But,” he barrels on, “well…” And then, subscribing to the picture better than words adage, he turns the camera to show him the rest of the room. Chris nods tiredly from one corner, Allison is still asleep sprawled on one of the chairs beside her dad and Peter is as poised as ever, to his right. There's no hiding the blood on their clothes... And then there's the six unconscious shifted werewolves on the stretchers, three of whom are contained with mountain ash. “This kind of happened?“

John is speechless for a second. “ _Are you hurt? Any immediate danger?_ ” Stiles denies both. “ _Where are you?_ ”

“Deaton’s.”

“ _I assume you’re going to be there for a while?_ ” He nods this time. “ _Collins is coming back. I’ll be back in two hours or so. I’ll bring you a change of clothes and something to eat, and then you can explain.“_

“Can you bring enough for four? And pick something for Ally to wear too from her drawer? If you think you can handle the terrible vision of a girl’s undies?” He waggles his eyebrows for effect and John snorts.

“ _Brat. Can do. Call if anything happens, ok?_ “

“Ooookay,” he singsongs tiredly. “Love you.”

“ _Love you too, kiddo._ “

—

Allison snorts herself awake adorably half an hour later and Stiles snickers, earning a dirty look from her. She feels observed and shifts her gaze. True enough, she finds herself under the intense scrutiny of Scott, who is, apparently, being checked by Deaton. She forces herself to ignore him to survey the room. From what she can see, none of the other werewolves have woken up yet. Sure enough he’s still watching her when she turns to look at her slumbering dad. She has to admit it’s a little creepy and that those cow eyes are getting on her nerves.

Then again, she’s certainly not feeling very tolerant at the moment, to be honest. She moves on the chair and grimaces at the sound she makes as she unsticks from it. Oh, what she would give for clean clothes… She doesn’t care about her appearance much per se, but she’s downright uncomfortable right now. She’s bloody from helping carry the werewolves to the SUV and tired from sleeping only a couple of hours, her neck and back unbelievably stiff and sore because of that. 

“Ally,” Stiles draws her attention softly. “I have a bag with my lacrosse things in the trunk. They’re clean if you want them? I’ll change when my father gets here,“ he adds before she can protest.

“Oh my God,” she sighs gratefully. “Love you so much, ducky!” She adopts a falsetto voice and he cracks, throwing her his car keys as he mouths the term of endearment incredulous. “Tell me you have some Ibuprofen too?”

“Glove box.”

She almost sprints to his jeep, the possibility of clean clothes almost too good to be true. Normally she wouldn’t care, but being on her period is making her feel extra filthy and uncomfortable. 

Allison picks the sports bag from the trunk first, before going to get the ibuprofen. She gapes at what she finds. Beautiful, beautiful Stiles. In the glove box she finds a compact box filled with three tampons and Midol. She doesn’t even know why she is surprised. She snorts amused. He probably has researched the hell out of what a girl needs when on their period. It can’t have been especially pleasant for him, but by now she knows very well that he is the type of friend that commits to the end, not giving two shits about what people may think of him for that. She knows he used to keep an inhaler both in his glove box and on himself for Scott. She grins fondly. He probably hasn’t put a plastic bag with spare panties in the emergency kit because he thought it would be too forward and she wouldn’t like it. As if she wasn’t forward herself when she left tampons and the like in his house. She snorts.

Allison enters the clinic with a spring in her step and, when she passes Stiles, he’s sporting a hesitant expression that shows he's questioning whether he overstepped or not. It makes her want to rip a new one to anyone who ever ridiculed him for the way he is because what he has done is one of the sweetest things a friend has ever done for her. No friend has ever been this thoughtful, so she detours to plant a kiss on his cheek.

“Thanks, ducky,” she says with a playful smile. Killing two birds with one stone and all that, because God, does she love trolling people. Scott growls and she ignores him.

“You know I’d do anything for you, snuggleduck,” he answers in a saccharin tone. She almost cackles.

“Is it okay if I add some things to it?”

“Sure,” he grins delighted. “I have one in my school bag if you want to add to it too?”

She laughs happily and continues to the toilet. Beautiful, beautiful Stiles. If this is what karma is giving her after so much shit… Things are looking up, finally.

—

Almost an hour later, Stiles is gaping at the seer absurdity of the situation. Okay, he didn’t expect gratitude (after all, he did electrocute them all), but he certainly didn’t expect this level of open hostility.

Chris is decidedly unimpressed and Allison looks ready to murder someone. She has her taser out and, the moment he’s spotted it, Scott has backed off from the argument as if burned. Isaac has cleverly taken a page from his book too and is observing the proceedings from a corner, keeping a healthy distance between her taser and himself (it's really funny that he prefers to be closer to Peter or Chris than to her, to be honest). Peter is alternately goading and placating his nephew, very subtly keeping Stiles at least partially covered (don’t think he hasn’t noticed the positioning, though, because he has). Derek, as usual, is spewing crap from his mouth about humans and danger, among all the recriminations he's throwing at him about hurting his baby sister. 

And then, in the middle of it, Derek does what he always does when he’s frustrated or doesn't know what to do: he tries to use brute force, or in this case, his alpha powers to end the discussion. He flashes his red eyes and, when it doesn’t work, he physically tries to get Peter out of the way along with a hurtful remark about family loyalty that makes Stiles cringe.

Now, it’s been a long, _long_ sleepless night, so Stiles has been thinking a lot.

Peter can be smarmy, witty, sarcastic and trying on a good day, and a twisted cruel scheming bastard on his bad days, that, he _knows_. However, whatever happened between them or how difficult Peter may be, Stiles has never liked the way Derek takes out his frustrations on him. He doesn’t think that Derek’s a bad person per se, but in a way he’s like Scott, because he can’t acknowledge his part of the blame for what happened with Peter, as if his uncle killing Laura negates the fact that they abandoned a pack member when he needed them the most, leaving him unprotected and condemning him to become an omega trapped in his own mind.

Bottom line, Derek can’t berate anyone about family loyalty. More so if you take into account the missing Cora, whom they left behind too, unknowingly or not. And especially so because Stiles has seen the police reports and he can connect the dots. On the day of the fire, the rest of the family was drugged and there was evidence all over the place of Peter dragging them to the basement, where their emergency secret exit was. Peter tried to save them all, showing more than enough family loyalty.

And the fire may have twisted him, maybe damaged him, leaving but a shadow of what he was, but some things remain untouched and others have sharpened to a dangerous degree. Peter, as he’s been trying to prove to him since he got shot, can also be loyal and protective in his own vicious way.

Like Stiles.

He reacts without thinking and fries Derek again before he can manhandle Peter.

Well, he supposes the decision is made. And he never does anything by halves. He’s willing to give him a chance and if he betrays him… well, he’s killed him before, he can do it again.

“Stiles, what the hell are you doing?” Scott bellows wide-eyed and Isaac hovers, unsure of what to do.

“Back the hell off!” Stiles shouts as he reaches for Peter and pulls him out of a groaning Derek’s reach.

Derek snarls at Stiles. Peter, just for a nanosecond before he covers it, sports a shocked expression, as if he’s surprised about Stiles actually defending him, even if this is exactly what he’s been working to achieve. As if someone sticking by him is a novel occurrence. Stiles doesn’t like what it implies. The spark snarls back at Derek.

“What the hell is going on here?” John demands appearing at the door, Deaton a silent presence behind him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter has dragged its feet way too much... I'm publishing it but to be honest I'm not completely sure about it. Some feedback would be appreciated, please?


	12. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, finally! Muse came back abruptly and I could finish this chapter :) Took me forever!
> 
> Thanks @@nineofour for proofing this~

Chapter 11

One day Stiles is going to learn that trick. 

With just those seven words, Derek springs back so fast it’s almost comical, Scott backs off even more than he already had, his back hitting the wall, and Isaac seems to melt into the decor. It's almost unnoticeable, but even Chris and Peter fidget minutely and Stiles doesn't have words to describe how amazing that is. Allison and Stiles share a gleeful look, lips twitching, and Derek scowls darkly when he catches them.

Silence reigns.

It has to be the tone… and the pose. The pose must have something to do with it too. He subconsciously mimics his father's posture and Allison muffles her amused snort. One day, Stiles vows with a mental fist raised in the air, and he will be unstoppable. Insert inner evil laughter.

Stiles blinks.

He really needs to sleep. He dozed off in class yesterday, but that’s only helping a bit. He rubs his forehead tiredly and his father’s eyes snap back to him immediately. John crosses the room quickly, just aiming a displeased frown towards Derek and Scott before focusing his attention on more important things.

“Did you sleep at all?“ John asks concerned, hand on his shoulder. His eyes search his son's form thoroughly and it's obvious he isn't pleased with what he finds.

“Not really?” Stiles admits with a chagrined smile.

“We’re going back home right now,“ John states in answer, already searching for his son's things to leave. Stiles grabs his sleeve to regain his attention.

“Can’t,” he explains with a resigned sigh at his dad's quizzical frown. “Apparently Deaton can’t take off the mountain ash I’ve placed? And I don’t know if there’s a limitation on how far I can be from it for it to work. I’ve never tested that.”

“And can’t he, I don't know, place his own so you can leave?“

“He says his won’t work as well or something.” He sighs as he shrugs, rolling his eyes. “And I’m not really willing to risk it, to be honest, with how feral they were.”

John hums unconvinced and messes his hair affectionately. “And what if they’re still feral when they wake up, mmm?” Stiles shrugs again and John sighs. “Well, we’ll cross that bridge when it comes, I suppose. Change your clothes at least and eat something. And maybe try to sleep on the chair? Or one of the gurneys would be better. You can use your bag as a pillow.”

“Ew, dad, not the gurneys. Do you even know what's been on them? Ew," he protests with a scrunched nose, inadvertently insulting his present company, who thinks that he's making a dig at them and scowl. Allison snickers and Peter coughs suspiciously. Even John and Chris' lips twitch and Stiles blinks at them confused. “Ok, to the chair, though?" he offers as he grabs the bag with clean clothes. “Allison’s?”

“I'm fine as I am,“ she interjects when John points at the same bag, huddling inside the too big hoodie with a cheeky smile.

That hoodie is pretty baggy on him, but on her? She even has her legs inside, looking like a big human burrito. Chris looks as if he’s resisting the temptation to snap a picture. Stiles doesn’t have any compunction whatsoever about just taking his phone out and doing it. She glares playfully, pulling the hood up with a sniff.

“I’m never getting those back, am I?“ he asks resigned as he pockets the phone again.

“The hoodie and the t-shirt? Never. I’m willing to reach a compromise about the pants, though.” She wiggles her feet at him, teasing.

“I asked him to bring underwear too?” His lips twitch when Allison springs from her seat with a hastily blurted _DEAL_ , nearly braining herself. They both ignore Scott’s embarrassed squeak. “You did bring it, didn’t you?”

“I did,“ John answers, playfully narrowing his eyes.

“After the concussion I didn’t know if asking you that was too risky, you know? You did nearly faint the other day when you opened the drawer, after all. But you seem just fine so…“ He gives him two thumbs up. “Congrats! Excuse me for doubting you for a moment there.” Allison snickers and John rolls his eyes, sharing a commiserating look with Chris. "You're the very best!"

“Brat.“

“Come on, ducky,“ Allison says as she pulls him in the direction of the backroom. Hilariously enough, Scott looks at Chris expecting protests or hell on earth or something equally terrifying, and frowns when the man just seems resigned. 

“Yeah, yeah, burrito,” he huffs, letting her and making sure to brush against Peter slightly as he passes by, faux accidentally.

They close the door behind them quietly and Allison starts pulling the hoodie up almost immediately, eager to get into clean underwear. She gets stuck and he snickers, coming closer to help her.

Afterwards, both of them turn somewhat to give each other a measure of privacy. He’s seen her in her underwear and the same goes for her, but seeing each other changing is another thing entirely.

“Oh my God, yes,“ she moans softly. “You asked for the sports bra.”

“Thought you’d prefer something comfy?“

“Definitely,” she assures him as she finishes dressing. Then she turns, gaze intense, and mouths to him quietly, well aware that if she whispers, no matter how softly, the werewolves outside most likely will hear her. “Peter?”

Stiles pauses for a moment, bare chested and with the t-shirt in his hands, and sits on a nearby chair. He hums quietly before putting it on absently. She comes near, nudges him a bit, and then sits on his lap. He wraps his arms around her and rests his chin on her shoulder.

Despite his impulsive reaction of protecting Peter, this is not something he’s diving into as a spur of the moment thing. There are a lot of reasons, actually, but not the ones that people would think.

It’s not about the attention or the books or the saving thing. Don’t get him wrong, he appreciates those. He loves not being told to shut up, he loves that both Allison and Peter (and his father progressively too) listen to him as if what he says has value, not just humoring him. The books, he adores those. And the saving thing? True, it’s nice to not be the one doing it always, to have some backup. But it’s not that.

Appreciated or not, it’s not about the grand gestures but about the minute details, about the involuntary reactions. Allison’s made him love her like a sister; Lydia’s made him concede defeat; Scott’s are hurting him more than what his actions will ever do. His father’s made him not give up on him. Peter’s, oh, Peter’s.

Insecurity, vulnerability, loneliness. Peter is very good at covering those reactions, at pretending that he doesn't have any weak spots, and Stiles would have trouble with that if he wasn’t so good at noticing them himself. That incredulity after Stiles protected him was just the last nail in the coffin.

Peter’s are making him willing to give him a second chance.

But how does he convey that without words? He looks at her helplessly and she sighs.

“Okay,” she murmurs, kissing his cheek and then resting her forehead momentarily on his. “Okay.” She then points at him, making a sad and hurt face, and proceeds to harden her expression into a vindictive one, adding a beheading motion with her hand. "Okay?"

“Love you, my duck burrito,“ he mutters, laughing softly.

“Love you too, ducky."

“Now get up, I really need to pee,“ he says hurriedly, pulling her up as he stands, and she snickers.

“Wait for you?“

“Nah, go ahead.”

When he gets out of the toilet, Scott is waiting for him, arms crossed and with that disappointed slash judgmental expression of his. Stiles internally sighs. He just doesn’t have the energy to do this right now. He’s exhausted and he doesn’t want to do anything that he’ll regret later only because his filter (what little he normally has) is gone and he can’t contain his cutting tongue. He may be angry at Scott, but that doesn’t mean he wants to hurt him.

“I’ve been patient about all of this but you’re going too far! Going after Allison because you’re pissed off?” Scott whispers angrily. “That’s not cool, dude.”

“What.“

“Is this because Lydia kissed me?” He goes on. “I can’t believe you’d sink so low as to go for Allison just to get back at me! And you defend the murderer who bit me too? You’re going way too far and this has to stop!”

Unbelievable. Stiles gapes, at a loss for words. He starts to feel the heat rising on his face as his anger mounts. So, to Scott, Stiles’ anger and all the actions he’s taken to (hopefully just temporarily) shut him out of his life are just a temper tantrum on his part? _He thinks he’s being magnanimous because he’s not calling Stiles out about his petty acts of revenge._

Nothing has changed, he hasn’t reflected about his actions or what Stiles has told him. He’s been thinking all this time that Stiles is just kicking and screaming like a contrary kid so he's been waiting for him to tire out and come back to him all apologetic and ashamed?

Something snaps in him.

“You, you, I can’t even!“ Scott makes to speak again and Stiles won’t have it. “NO, you shut the fuck up. I’m gonna say my piece and you’re gonna fucking listen or else, I swear to God!”

And the dam is broken like it hasn’t ever before. He barrels on about everything, Scott looking more and more stricken with each passing minute, but the kid gloves are off, Stiles won’t spare him this time, because it’s obvious that every other approach he’s taken has failed and he just can't take it anymore.

He starts from the things he used to do before he was bitten and why he always gave him a pass because of other good things he also used to do but doesn’t anymore. He goes on to all the shit he’s been doing and Scott goes paler and paler, but he doesn’t stop.

He’s not yelling, his ire is even beyond that, and Scott, who could have left any minute if he so wished, is still as if stuck to the ground.

After he finally tells him about what him not picking up the phone when he called repeatedly yesterday meant to him, Scott looks about to be sick but Stiles doesn’t have any mercy whatsoever and tackles the Peter issue. He doesn’t care if Derek is listening or not.

“And you know what? If someone killed my family and I was in the same situation as him? There would be no place on earth for them to hide where I wouldn’t find them. I would tear them apart.”

“He killed his own family!“ Scott finally sputters.

“ _I said to fucking listen_ ," Stiles snaps viciously. "Maybe that wasn’t the best or maybe it was. I’m not going to judge because I don’t know the exact circumstances, but guess what, overkill or not, I don’t need all the information to tell not everything was on Peter.”

“What?!“

“She was the alpha and she abandoned an injured member of her pack. Okay, she was young and scared or whatever, but what, in more than five years she couldn’t go back for him? Peter was in a hospital where anyone could have walked in and killed him anytime. And let's not get deep into what kicking him out of the pack and leaving him an omega did to him at the worst time possible. Because, have no doubt, that’s exactly what she did.”

“You didn’t think like this before! You helped kill him!“

“I defended mine and myself. If he hadn’t attacked us, I wouldn’t have cared.”

“He bit me! Are you seriously defending him? He threatened my mom! I can’t believe this. What part of murderer you don’t get?“

“I’m curious, what part don’t _you_ get?”

“What?“

“You’re condemning Peter for killing the ones that murdered his family, but you plotted with us to kill him to protect your mom and be human again. And what about what you did to Gerard behind everyone’s back?”

“You killed Gerard! And I wasn’t going to kill him, it was just a…“

“So just because you wouldn’t have killed him with your own hands you think you wouldn’t have been responsible? Think again.”

“I…“

“No,” Stiles cuts in implacably. “No, I don’t want to hear it. I’m tired of this and I can’t take it anymore. Don’t talk to me until you’ve _really_ thought about what I’ve just told you. If you continue like this,” he takes a deep shuddering breath, “I don’t want to have anything to do with you. I love you like a brother, I really do, but this is too much. You’re tearing me apart and I just… can’t.”

Scott is speechless, too shocked to even think about stopping Stiles as he passes him.

—

Silence has reigned since Stiles came back from the toilet and no one has dared to break it. His dad was passing the bags filled with food just when Melissa called and forced Scott to leave for school. Derek, following her example, forced Isaac to go too and both teens left grudgingly but subdued.

Allison is to Stiles' right, munching a sandwich with her legs interwoven with his. Peter is sitting on his other side, thoughtful, his gaze never leaving the still passed out Cora for too long. His knee touched Stiles’ about half an hour ago and the contact hasn’t stopped since. Chris and John are at the front of the clinic, where, presumably, the hunter is bringing him up to speed. Derek is watching his still unconscious pack and sister like a hawk, face blank and hands clenched. His posture and countenance spark a memory in Stiles suddenly.

Almost ten years ago, he woke late at night to the sound of his father’s cruiser pulling into the drive. He remembers thinking it strange, because he had kissed his father and made him promise to be careful and to give him a kiss before he left for school the next day, when he would arrive after his night shift.

He has very vague recollections of going downstairs and finding his mother preparing something in the kitchen with a frown on her face. The rest is blurry up until his father ushered a pair of teens to the guest room. He remembers clearly a much younger and shocked Derek sitting on the bed, in the same position, with clenched hands and a blank face. He remembers a girl crying. For some reason, the one he gave his batman plushie to wasn’t her.

His memory is even foggier after that point, but he never saw that plushie again and both teens were gone when he woke up the next morning.

(He wonders if Derek still has it somewhere.)

He doesn’t regret snapping and having said those things, but a part of him cringes thinking about Derek hearing it put so callously. He doesn’t think Derek is a bad person per se, because he’s not blind and can see that generally speaking he always has good intentions. It’s just that he’s handling the situations he’s in very badly, which normally has consequences that suck for Stiles. Case in point: the pool and all that manhandling. And while Stiles understands where it all might come from, he’s not willing to be pushed around either.

He grabs one of the sandwiches and throws it at Derek, probably with more force than strictly necessary. The showoff doesn’t look up to catch it in the air, but he does turn to glare at Stiles afterwards.

“I don’t…” 

“Can it,“ he interrupts him harshly. Peter looks at him blankly and he passes him something more to eat too, since the man has already finished the first sandwich Stiles gave him. “You’ll do them no good if you faint, so eat.” 

Derek flashes him menacing wolf teeth briefly but takes a bite and catches midair another sandwich and a bottle of water that Stiles throws at him none too gently. Afterwards, the teen ignores him and turns to pass a bottle of water to Peter too. Then he settles back on his chair and Allison leans her head on his shoulder tiredly.

\----

Derek can’t get Stiles, he really can't. But then again, it’s not like he gets anyone ever since the whole thing with Paige happened. He keeps misjudging everyone and every situation. It’s frustrating and disheartening. He misses having someone that understands without him having to explain. His family was good at that. Laura too.

Uncle Peter too.

What does he have now? Laura is gone, by Peter’s hands, and now he’s the alpha, which he has no training whatsoever for. The instincts are so powerful and overwhelming… and his pack is full of brats that don’t want him or respect him or the gift that he gave them beyond the fact that they are now more powerful than their bullies. That's definitely not helping either. And, okay, he chose them, but when he did, he thought he was choosing strong-willed people that needed help and that would be loyal to him for it. He knows he wasn’t as unselfish as he should have been when he turned them, but he was rushing because he was feeling desperate to not become an omega, because an alpha without a pack is a terrifying thing.

Also, he may not be doing a very good job as their alpha, but he’s trying. And it’s not like they are making things easy. They keep defying him and disobeying, making the alpha in him bristle and want to make them submit. They also keep taking and taking, not giving back anything, always judgmental and dismissive about the decisions that they don’t like. The don’t even acknowledge their pack bonds and he can’t keep being the only one that keeps them active. It's fraying his nerves and making everything even worse than he would have thought possible. He could acknowledge the bond with Peter but just the thought makes his stomach roll and makes him want to rage. And things keep happening, the problems keep piling up, and it’s like he’s swimming against the currents.

It’s exhausting and frustrating and futile and pointless.

And now he learns that they left Cora behind all those years ago. They left her alone and hurt from the fire and defenseless. Packless when she needed them the most.

He swallows, his eyes involuntarily straying to his uncle, and he feels more exhausted and done with everything than ever before.

\----

Erica starts to stir and Derek, who has been deeply lost in his mind for the last ten minutes, seems to snap out of it, his attention back on her immediately. He gets up and approaches the gurney, just shy of touching the mountain ash line. Behind him, Boyd makes a soft sound but doesn’t stir yet. 

Erica’s eyes snap open, her whole body going tense abruptly, and her eyes zero in on Derek. A hurt sound escapes her and she launches herself at him, only to slam into the barrier and fall to the ground with a pained cry. Boyd startles awake and instinctively throws himself at the threat.

“Break the line!“ Derek turns to snarl at Stiles. The teen doesn’t sit up, but the mountain ash starts slithering on the floor like a snake, away from the gurney and into a bag. Boyd’s stays. Derek gathers Erica from the ground carefully. “The mountain ash, Stiles!”

“I’m not taking his off until I see he’s not feral,“ he answers stubbornly, still on his chair. 

Allison disentangles her legs from Stiles' as she takes her taser out and Peter is tense, but he doesn't move either. John and Chris enter followed by Deaton, but maintain a healthy distance just in case.

Boyd, chest heaving, seems to finally recognize his surroundings and wrestles his transformation off. He gasps Derek's name, eyes wide and never leaving his alpha or Erica. Stiles takes that as a sign of him not being feral and recalls the mountain ash around him too. Derek reaches for him with Erica still curled on his lap.

Half an hour later, just as Deaton is finishing checking over both teens, Cora wakes. It's very anticlimactic, there’s no tearful reunion. She’s distant, acidic and sarcastic, so basically, another emotionally stunned Hale. Stiles is not surprised by that. What Stiles said to Scott must have made Derek think, because he doesn’t immediately throw Peter to the wolves (ironically accurate given the current situation) for killing Laura. Not long after, Derek is insisting they leave and Erica, Boyd and Cora go with him.

Peter doesn’t even make to follow and remains unmoving beside Stiles. Derek looks back when he notices, swallowing thickly, but doesn’t call his uncle.

The rest of them vacate the place quickly after that and Deaton looks slightly relieved about it. Stiles grabs Peter's wrist, startling him a little by the unexpectedly bold movement, and pulls as he’s about to follow his father out.

“Daaaad!" he singsongs brightly before changing his tone to an exaggeratedly concerned one. “I've just found this man and I think he’s Peter Hale! I thought he was ruled dead? That can’t be right!” He plants a kiss on a snorting Allison as he passes her and continues pulling Peter to follow him. "Maybe we should go to the station and look this up?"

“You’re not going anywhere but bed,“ his father states, rolling his eyes.

“Stiles?” Allison calls him with a wicked smile and he turns to look at her quizzically. She points to her pants with a smirk. "I lied, you'll never see them again.”

"You do realize you just admitted to stealing in the presence of an agent of the law, right?"

"Did I?"

Stiles pauses and thinks about the phrasing she used. "You didn't," he teen whines, pouting, still grabbing Peter's wrist. ”Fineeeee. Like I expected anything else," he grumbles. "But you don't get a freebie on them too or at this rate you'll take over my closet and I'll end up having to put on your skirts."

"You do have the legs for it," she quips and her dad's lips quirk.

"I do," he answers flippantly with narrowed eyes and wiggles his eyebrows, "but you don't get them for free anyway." He throws his car keys to her. "You get chauffeur duty or no pants at all."

"Because you can't drive, you're about to fall sleep, aren't you?"

"The sidewalk is looking really inviting right now,” he deadpans pointing to his right with his thumb.

"That there looks a lot like dog pee, Stiles."

"Desperate times, Ally."

"Dog pee."

"It's just dirty water when it comes down to it," he shrugs and Peter covers a snort.

“Definitely not driving,“ his father interrupts the bantering, but Allison is already heading towards Stiles' jeep, throwing a jaunty wave over her shoulder.

True to his word, the teen conks out on the cruiser's backseat five minutes later, just after using the last of his strength to manage to fire off a text. The phone is still clutched in his limp hand where he let it fall. His jaw is as slack as the rest of his body and soft snores are coming from it because of the awkward position he has fallen asleep in. His other hand is still grabbing Peter and not letting go.

Peter hasn't made a move to take it off him.

\----

Two hours later, Peter is officially Peter Hale again.

He’s penniless, homeless and has little possessions to speak of save from some books he managed to keep secreted away, but he’s himself again and that is priceless. He can have a life again, maybe even start over, and for a moment that is terribly overwhelming. He feels like choking on thin air just for a minute, before he pushes that thought to the back of his head. Baby steps. He has to concentrate first on the immediate things, he can think about the others later.

First, he needs money to begin to set things up for himself and it's going to be tricky for various reasons.

One, reclaiming his part of the insurance money is going to take a while and he's not even sure that he wants it. That money feels tainted and while normally he would make use of anything at his disposal to cover his needs, unless he doesn't have any other choice, he doesn't want to touch it with a ten-foot pole. Still, even not wanting to use it, it's better to have that kind of backup in case of an emergency and he will look into it just for that.

Two, the family vault is inaccessible to him for now. It's always been under the name of the alpha, so after the fire it went first to Laura and then to Derek. The rest of the pack members are normally authorized access by the holder of the vault when it changes hands, but Laura (and much less likely Derek) never did that with Peter. So, all in all, that vault is completely out of reach to him unless Derek authorizes him, and, facing the truth, that's most probably never going to happen.

Three, and hell, this one stings the most, Peter's secret bank account went to Derek when he was declared dead. All his life savings that he fought so hard to accumulate are his nephew's now and he's pretty sure that's the money he has been using (even if frugally) because, if Peter doesn't want to touch the insurance money, Derek sure as hell feels physically sick at even the thought of using it. Thankfully, Peter thinks that he can get it back but it's going to take a while. Which is the most inconvenient thing, because even though Peter has a little secret vault still to his name, he has only books that he would never sell no matter what, so that's a no go too.

So no viable source of immediate income for now even if he somehow manages to get a job today. But well, it's not like he will go hungry, to be honest, because he can hunt. And he's lived in the wild before so even though he's not looking forward to it, he'll manage somehow.

He’s still wondering how to proceed exactly when he receives a text from an unknown number. After reading it, he laughs delightedly. Ah, his resourceful boy.

—

Stiles sleeps the rest of the day away until the alarm rings the next day's morning. When he finally wakes up and manages to pry himself from under the covers, he finds a key on his windowsill.

 **To Creeperwolf:** _You’re incorrigible._

 **From Creeperwolf:** _I try._

 **From Creeperwolf:** _Good to see my efforts aren’t in vain._

 **To Creeperwolf:** _I’m rolling my eyes so hard, I think I sprained something._

He looks at the key pensively, turning it between his fingers and pondering about the implications of Peter essentially giving him complete access to his den. He receives a new text, this time with an address.

“Stiles! Allison’s here!“

“Coming!”

He slips the key onto his own keychain and grabs his bag, trotting downstairs. Well, yesterday he wasn't shy about staking his claim on Peter, so that’s probably why? A bold move for a bold move? Or maybe now that Peter knows he won't be rejected right off the bat he feels secure enough...

“Lo!“ Allison waves from the driver’s seat with a cheeky grin.

Stiles stops abruptly. From what he can see, she’s wearing black somewhat ripped jeans, a cool black and gold jacket that he really likes… and one of his graphic t-shirts (I can only please one person a day. Today isn’t your day. Tomorrow doesn’t look good either) underneath, tied to the side.

“Seriously?” 

“You can borrow my things too if you want?“ she answers brazenly, her smile growing.

“I’m taking the knives.”

“No, not the knives!“

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some feedback, please?


	13. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*
> 
> Proofed by @nineorfour~

Chapter 12

“Think they’ll be at school today?“ Allison muses thoughtfully as she drives.

“Nah. I know dad gave them the ultimatum to go to the station yesterday but their families probably won’t let them out of their sight for a while?”

“Mmm, maybe.“

“We need to stop for coffee,“ Stiles groans, resting his face on the cool window. His dad woke him throughout the day yesterday to have him eat something but after dinner he was dead to the world, so he’s slept more than twelve hours in a row and his head’s killing him.

“I don’t know if coffee is the best thing for you right now, ducky,“ she tells him dubiously even as she takes the second exit on the roundabout.

“Not for me, I don’t wanna puke my guts out, thank you very much,“ he grumbles. “It’s for Danny.“

“Thanks for the nice imagery. Just what I was missing on this nice sunny morning,” she quips dryly. “For hacking the feed?”

“Mmhm. And for unfreezing Peter’s bank account.“

“Unfreezing… And when did that happen exactly? Because when we left you were already drooling on Peter's shoulder.”

_"Was not."_

"I have a pic. You were so cute I couldn't resist."

"You fiend, attacking me when I was down..."

"I'm willing to trade for the one you took when I..."

"Never. I have that as my wallpaper and before you get any funny ideas, I have a copy in a secure place."

"What a coincidence!" she exclaims sweetly. "I've done the same... except I have you as my lockscreen too."

Stiles groans and she snickers. “I texted him when we left Deaton’s,“ he grumbles closing his eyes, silently admitting defeat. “I wanna get him coffee at least. I’ll think later about how to pay him back better, right now my brain is jello.“ He waves a memory stick at her half-heartedly. “I got him some encryption texts I know he will like, but I don’t think that’s enough.”

Allison hums noncommittally, her mind strangely stuck on one thing. Of course he did that for Peter, she thinks, because that’s what he does when he takes someone under his wing. Just like he did with Allison when he decided to take a chance on her. And now…

“Peter hates the Argents,” she murmurs softly and she doesn’t even know why she's bringing that up.

Stiles, wonderful Stiles, seems to get the non-sequitur anyway, even if she doesn’t fully get it herself. He shifts a little without opening his eyes and his hand lands on her wrist. “Pull over for a bit?”

She does, heart in her throat, beating hard and fast. She looks at the hand that’s resting on her wrist and bites her lip. She’s not jealous, it’s not that. But…

Stiles, for his part, mulls over how to phrase what he wants to say. He normally is more of a fan of ignoring the problem until it goes away but… He gets her. He knows intimately the fear of having the rug pulled from under your feet when you finally have found some kind of stability. It’s a little different for her than how it was for him (she has Stiles himself and her father is steady as a rock) but he knows if he was in her situation he would be very protective of what he had too. God knows he wished for it when his mother died and his father started drinking.

Still, talking about feelings? It really makes him uncomfortable. Stilinski men are more the kind of people that talk through their actions, and he’s still feeling raw after having to spell it out to Scott, and… He takes a look at her face and sighs. That’s not what she needs.

Sometimes you have to do things you don’t especially like to, to ensure your loved one’s happiness. It’s a give and take and she’s holding up her end of the bargain beautifully, and…

“Okay,“ he starts, biting his lip and tapping his fingers on her wrist. “Okay.”

“Stiles?“ 

“Argent or not,” he swallows, feeling his face grow hot already, “you’re… you're like my sister now and he’s gonna have to accept that if he wants me to be pack.” When he doesn’t receive any reply to his bold statement, he dares to look at her and blanches. “Oh my God, you’re crying. Why are you crying?” He fumbles one handed (because she has reached to grasp the hand he has on her wrist and won’t let go) through the glove box for a tissue. “No, please, don’t cry… Oh, come on… Ally. Look at me? Please?”

“I just, I… need a second, okay?“ she whispers hiccuping after a second. He sighs, finally getting that she’s not only crying because of his words. 

“Okay, come here, my duck burrito,“ he says lovingly as he pulls her awkwardly over the lever to sit on his lap. 

She curls into a ball as he embraces her and then weeps silently for a few minutes. He rests his head on her dark curls and keeps mostly still, only rubbing her arm when he starts to get restless.

Allison doesn’t lift her head when she’s done crying and Stiles debates with himself for a moment, remembering his kid self so long ago, and how embarrassed he felt because he had thought himself stronger than that, that he had his panic attacks under control and losing it just because… He knows now that being strong isn’t the issue. 

“When…“ He swallows, mouth suddenly dry. Allison doesn’t move. “When my mom died, things were… difficult for some time.” Understatement of the century. Stiles had to learn to control his panic attacks on his own because his dad was drunk or gone most of the time. The man's mind was just as frequently gone too and he didn't always remember to restock the fridge or some other necessities. Stiles learned to do a wide range of things during that time. From making pasta to ensuring his dad didn’t choke on his own vomit almost daily for that first month, he waded through it all. “Then, one day, it suddenly got better, and, what's more, _it remained better._ ” His dad got marginally better and eased off on the drinking a bit and, one morning, he kissed Stiles' forehead absently before going to work. And the next day he messed his short hair. And after a week, Stiles finally believed that things were getting better when his dad actually showed at a parent-teacher meeting. After his father left that day for his night shift… “I locked myself in the bathroom, cried like you can’t believe and worked myself into a panic attack. Just because… well, I suppose that a lot of things all rolled into one, really. But relief, mainly, I think, and fear that everything would fall apart again.“

 _(Dad kissed me, dad touched me, dad looked at me, dad saw me. Will this last? What if this gets taken from me? I thought he hated me because he knew... What if he finds out? Will it get even worse?_ )

_(He can't ever find out that I'm glad she's gone and she can’t hurt me anymore.)_

“You were a kid,“ she sniffles softly. “I’m not. I shouldn’t be crying like a baby because I’m happy.“

“I still have those panic attacks sometimes, Ally. It’s not a matter of age.”

“I…“

“Think of it as a glass of water. Some things fill it up, other’s make it lose some of that water inside. It’s a question of balance, I suppose? Your glass just overflowed. That happens to kids, to adults, to anyone. Age may change the way you face or process things that happen to you and the size of that glass, yeah, but losing your mother? That would fill anyone’s glass. Fuck, it overflowed mine, and sometimes, on the anniversary of her death it still does. Having a weak moment doesn’t mean that you aren’t strong. Hell, having a lot of them doesn’t mean that either.” She sighs and relaxes against him. He sighs too and adds softly, chagrined. “I’m sorry for pushing you over the edge. I didn't mean to overwhelm you.”

Allison lifts her head to look at him intensely. Her eyes are red and puffy and she’s clutching at the tissue as if it's a lifeline. Her hands are trembling a little but her gaze is steady.

"Going to the hospital that day was the best decision I’ve made in a long time,” she says simply.

Stiles blushes and hides his face in her hair. Allison contains a fond snicker and blows her nose noisily instead. After a moment, he starts to fidget restlessly.

“It’s not that I’m not happy and all that, but can we stop with the open sharing of feelings and go back to the tacit understanding? Pretty please? Tacit, unspoken, I like, no, _love_ those words.“

She laughs and kisses his cheek. “I knew you loved me,” she singsongs as she climbs back to the driver’s seat. “You do keep tampons in your bag for me, after all, and if that’s not what a brother would do…” 

“Wrong,“ he corrects her grumbling. “That’s what I did for you as my bestie. I went a step further for my sister and let you steal my favorite hoodie without consequences.”

She cackles. Yes, she’s pretty proud of that decision. “I don’t think I’m gonna give back this t-shirt either.”

“You’re abusing your privileges!“

“That’s a sister’s privilege too,” she singsongs and he groans. She stops suddenly as if thinking about something and he eyes her quizzically. “Your birthday is in April…” 

“And?“ She grins delightedly. “I don’t like that devil smile of yours when it’s aimed at me. _What now_.”

“Mine is in January, oh lil brother.“

“Oh, come on!“ 

“This is awesome.“

“No, it’s not.“

“The best thing ever.“

“ _No, it’s not._ “

—

Stiles doesn’t want to bring attention to Danny, so he simply picks the lock of his locker swiftly while Allison covers him, and places the scalding coffee inside along with the memory stick.

It’s confusingly difficult to find a window to do it undetected because, for some reason, everyone seems to be paying attention to them. They don’t get it until Allison listens to some girls gossip in the toilet. What Stiles hears in the toilet himself gets them the whole picture.

It seems the rumors that were already circulating the first day of class have reached epic proportions just because both Stiles and Allison were absent yesterday. Add to it that Isaac and Scott were late, and that when they appeared their faces were… well. And today Scott won’t even look at Stiles, and every time he sees him he goes out of his way to avoid crossing him. Also, Allison and Stiles won’t leave each other’s side, even going as far as to wait for each other at the door when one of them has to go to the toilet. And, to make matters worse, someone saw them parked to the side of the road and she seemed to be crying while he petted her.

Apparently all those things are evidence that proves that the reason why Scott has finally ditched Stiles in favor of Isaac is that Allison and Stiles betrayed him and are having a baby (proved also by the fact that she’s not driving her car, which what???), and everyone is saying that’s also why Gerard Argent lost it and tried to kill him to avenge Allison’s honor. Moreover, that’s why her father has been grudgingly letting him be around her when he famously forbid her relationship with Scott.

Of course there are even more convoluted variations (it’s Scott’s baby and he’s being a dick while Stiles’ is the best thing ever since the creation of the Internet, for example) flying around that put Stiles' novelas to shame and part of him wants to get some popcorn, sit and enjoy.

Allison snorts before she bursts out laughing. “Incest,” she wheezes and Stiles rolls his eyes.

A passing girl gapes at them and then hurries forward. Not even a minute later, they spot her whispering furiously to another two girls while a nearby gaping boy not-so-subtly listens.

“You did that on purpose,“ Stiles sighs, reluctantly impressed.

“You can prove nothing.”

—

Halfway through the last period, things go south. Stiles is exiting the toilet to return to class, when a hand suddenly grabs him and throws him to the wall. He grunts as he rebounds from it and he’s grabbed again before he can fall to the ground. When they start to shake him harshly, he instinctively calls the ash out and he hears a howl in response.

“Fuck,“ he grunts as he’s dropped. His vision clears a bit and he spots the twins. They growl at him and then they _laugh_ when he calls more ash out. “What the hell?!“

Suddenly there’s just one humongous werewolf with him in the toilet and Stiles gapes for a second before springing from where he’s still sprawled on the tiled floor. He fires the ash up as he crawls under its legs and relishes as much as he can in its pained howl even as he collides against the door and fumbles with the knob to open it. He sprints down the hall to the swimming pool. He takes out his phone and tries to run even faster as the guttural growls grow near. He skids at a turn and grabs one of the windows to pull himself forward. 

The moment he sees the call has connected, he doesn’t even try to bring the phone to his ear as he wheezes repeatedly. “Emergency, pool right now!” The air shifts behind him and he shoots the ash backwards, earning himself another frustrated grunt and a few precious seconds. 

Stiles shoots another blast blindly and manages another burst of speed to put the pool between them. He gasps, trying to regain his breath and eyes the prowling werewolf. He tries to recall as much ash as he can but it doesn’t work very well as he’s pretty far from where he used the most. Awesome time to test the limitations of the ash, he thinks sarcastically.

“Fuck,“ he gasps and it laughs again. 

“You know you can’t win,” it mocks him and Stiles gives him the finger. 

They are in a stalemate and they know it. On the one hand, if they keep on joined like they are now, Stiles can call the cavalry and keep circling the pool until they arrive or the massive werewolf concedes defeat and leaves. On the other hand, they can separate to try and catch him, but then his ash can take them… or it could if he had enough. Not that he’s planning on letting them know that, of course. 

“It doesn’t look like you can win either,“ he mocks them back.

“How fast can you run?“

“Wh-fuck!!!“

Or they can outrun him.

What saves him in the end is that they’re sick fucks that weren’t taught by their parents to not play with their food. They toy with him for a while, going faster and slower alternatively to give him a false sense of hope. Stiles knows it, though, and he keeps what little ash he has left and concentrates on keeping running and on regulating his breathing. They laugh at his efforts.

Allison bursts in just as he’s finishing another lap. Apart from her trusty taser, she has his bag on her hand. He immediately calls all the ash out with an exhilarated shout and throws it at the werewolf. It stumbles but doesn’t go down. Allison jumps forward, tasing it and they separate with pained howls. He pushes them into the pool with another blast and then he electrocutes them.

“What the hell is that thing’s voltage?“ he wheezes out looking at the taser in Allison’s hands. She catches him as he falls to the ground exhausted. “I hit it repeatedly and it was like I was tickling them, and you take just one shot with that thing and they separate.“ He ignores her _how’s that even possible?!_ ”Did your dad give you a lightsaber or what? My dad’s law enforcement, why don’t I get a lightsaber?”

“Shouldn’t we be focusing, I don’t know, on the bodies in the pool? Are they even dead?“ They eye the water suspiciously. ”Ah, whatever, more pressing problems here. Class is about to finish and if they find us here…”

“Okay, I get your point, but I get to revisit the matter later. Brother prerogative. Yep, you don’t get all the perks here. I want a lightsaber.“

“Yeah, yeah.“

The bell rings and they look at each other wide-eyed. They curse as they scramble to fish the twins out of the water. Just as they have finished pulling the second one out, he moves, and Allison yelps, tasing him out of reflex. They look at each other for a second and she tases the other twin again for good measure.

They pull them to the changing room and then lock the doors. They look at each other again as they start hearing students entering the pool area.

“Now what?“ Allison whispers furiously, eyeing the locked door panicky as the doorknob rattles.

“Coach? The door is locked,“ a male student says.

Stiles squeaks silently for a second, at loss for words, and looks around panicked. Coach Finstock’s cursing grows near and they both flail. Stiles spots the fire alarm and he throws himself at it like starving man at food. Coach Finstock curses again as it begins ringing and starts herding everyone out.

Allison and Stiles deflate exhausted. He lets himself slide down the wall to sit on the ground. She covers her eyes and breathes slowly. One of the twins stirs and, without even looking, she tases him again.

—

“I have to admit, Stiles, that this is not what I was expecting when you asked me to come,“ Peter drawls, squatting down on the changing room floor and poking at one of the twins.

“My life goal is to surprise people,“ Stiles deadpans dryly. “Now, how the hell do we take them out of this place without anyone noticing? We can’t wait until dark. Coach may have sent everyone home and canceled practice, but that doesn’t mean he’s not coming back.”

“And why exactly can’t we kill them and, I don’t know, chop them up?“ Peter asks nonchalantly as he lets his claws out and wiggles them at them. “That would certainly make transportation easier.” Both Stiles and Allison look at him unimpressed. “Just asking.”

“We’re going to have to wing it,” Stiles decides finally when no other solution presents itself. “Here’s the deal. We take one,” he says pointing at Allison and himself, before pointing at Peter, “and you take the other one. Peter is on lookout duty and, if they move a single hair, we drop them and you tase the hell out of them, Ally. Whatever happens, don’t let them combine again.”

“Combine.“ 

“Yep,“ Allison pops as she straightens. Baby steps, she tells herself. It’s obvious the man isn’t going to take the first step, so, for Stiles, she’s going to be the one that does it. Peter doesn’t outwardly react but he doesn’t sneer either, so she counts that as a win. Stiles’ lips twitch. “See those lockers? Double them.“

“Let’s not forget the fact that my Pikachu just tickles them when they’re combined.“ A tiny version of the normal Pikachu hovers over his shoulder almost apologetically and Stiles simply pets it as he would a normal pet. Most of his ash is now diluted in the pool, so he will try to call what he left in the halls as they leave.

“Why aren’t we chopping them again? Or at least one of them? Do we even need the two of them?”

“Information and leverage to all of them. Come on, stop whining,“ he bumps into him on purpose. He then murmurs, knowing perfectly well that he can hear him. “Cranky old man.“

“Sweetheart, F.Y.I., yes, coming back from the dead has left my abilities somewhat impaired, but the hearing still works.“

“I know, and that’s why you’re the lookout.“

It’s a miracle that they don’t get caught. They retrieve Allison’s bag from class and Stiles keeps calling the mountain ash as they advance. There are so many close saves that Stiles isn’t sure that he can get his heart to beat normally ever again. The worst, by far, is having to cram five people into the janitor’s closet.

“Oh my God,” Stiles whimpers softly as he tries to pry the mop from between his butt cheeks at the same time he keeps one of the twins up, arms starting to tremble. He throws a warning glare to a very amused Peter. Allison is covering her mouth so that she doesn’t cackle at him and he glares at her too. Outside, Finstock is cursing the little shit that thought it was funny to use the fire alarm and telling some kind of crazy story to whoever he’s talking to.

Of course, one of the twins chooses that very exact moment to stir.

“Seriously? What the hell do these twins eat?“ Stiles whispers incredulous.

Allison waves the taser at him and he makes a big abort gesture. In this close contact they may as well electrocute themselves. Of course Finstock chooses to stop just outside to keep ranting and they flail silently.

Peter rolls his eyes and reaches forward to wrap his hand around the teen's neck. Allison picks up a dirty rag fast and shoves it into his mouth. When the twin convulses, Allison and Stiles grab him with all their strength to stop him from moving. After a moment he stops struggling and Peter unhands him. The man raises an eyebrow at them.

Smarmy bastard.

They get to the parking lot and feign helping their captives into the jeep just in case someone is watching. Stiles immobilizes them with the ash he’s recovered from the halls and closes the door with a grunt.

“What about their bikes?“ Allison says. “If we leave them here…”

“They won’t fit in my jeep.“

“I can drive one,” Peter chimes in.

“I know how to drive one too,“ Allison tells him dubiously, “but I don’t like the idea of leaving you alone with them very much. What if they wake up?”

“First, do I even want to know how the hell you got here?“ Stiles asks raising an eyebrow and then he rolls his eyes when Peter just smirks at him. “Second, it's not like we many options. Either we leave the bikes here or I drive alone. The barrier should hold them now that they’re not combined.”

“Drive slow and with their windows down. I’ll go right behind you and if either of their hearts even hints that they’re waking up, I don’t care about information or leverage, I’ll rip their throats out,“ Peter tells him in a tone that leaves no room for an argument.

“What he said,“ Allison agrees implacably.

“Of all times to coincide on something…“ Stiles grumbles as he climbs into the jeep.

“I’d say that your safety is a pretty good thing to agree on,“ Allison points out as she deftly filches the keys from one of the twin’s pockets.

“What she said,” Peter drawls, doing the same after getting the keys from Allison. “Though I doubt it’s an occurrence that will repeat itself.”

“Stiles’ health, Stiles’ avenging in case the Stiles’ protection fails in any aspect. Everything Stiles.“

“I reluctantly concede the point.“

“You both are ridiculous,“ Stiles protests.

In for a penny, Allison thinks. She smiles at Peter sweetly. “Glad we agree on something, but let's make things clear. If I find out this thing you've got going is some sort of scheme that will hurt my brother, _I don’t care about how wrong it is, I’ll find you and burn you for days until you get how bad that idea was, and then I’ll kill you._ ”

“And if I find you’re pulling an Argent on him, just like your bitch of an aunt did, what I did to her will be child’s play compared to what I’ll do to you. In other words, _you’ll beg me to kill you._ “

“Do you want some tea and biscuits to go with your lovely conversation or can we move this show on? Don't mind me, though, it's not like we have anything pressing to do anyway,“ Stiles snarks from inside the jeep, a healthy dust of red on his cheeks.

—

They take them to the train depot and tie them there. While they wait for them to wake up, Stiles mulls over some things.

First, he needs to start experimenting with runes as soon as possible. Today was a wake-up call like no other and the worst time to find out the spatial and distance limitations of the ash. In his panic, he forgot to recall it as he used it and then it was too late and he couldn’t do it at all. He eyes the small tattoo dancing on his forearm and, gauging it, it's a third of its normal size.

He definitely needs more guns in his arsenal.

Second, he’s a little bit confused by Peter. He’s had the possibility to become an alpha again available to him for two hours now and he’s yet to make a move. When he called him to help them, Stiles expected to have to fight him all the way to stop him from killing them. No such thing has happened besides the offhand offer to chop them for easier transportation and it's really puzzling.

“One of them is waking up,” Peter informs them without taking his eyes from one of the journals he had in his jeep. He's been studying Stiles' notes for the encryption tome with a really interested gleam in his eyes since Stiles let him have it.

He rubs his hands, remembering that to get information out of someone, you don’t actually have to follow through on your threats, but make people believe you will. And Stiles is a master of half truths and bullshitting people without actually lying, so…

—

“A true alpha,” Stiles says skeptically. “Let me get this straight. This Deucalion dude wants Scott, not Derek, because he’s a true alpha.“

“Yes! I’ve told you! Please let us go!”

“We’ll leave town and never bother you again! We promise, please!“

“Silence,“ he snaps and their mouths shut with an audible click. He looks at them. They’re kids. One of them is so afraid that he’s even crying. The other twin keeps trying to bring Stiles’ attention to himself instead of his brother, but he’s pretty terrified too. He contains a sigh or any outward sign that would betray his thoughts and smiles instead. They’re instantly on guard. “The problem here is that I have no guarantee that you’ll follow through and leave, because you’re more afraid of Deucalion than you are of me.” They make to protest and Stiles raises his hand sharply. They jump in their seats. “So, the way I see it, we have two options here. Either I kill you and save myself the trouble… or I ensure that the tables turn and you’re more afraid of me than you are of him before letting you leave. Of course you’d owe me one, you understand.” He lets his smile widen dangerously. “Well? What is it gonna be? I’m feeling merciful and I’ll even let you choose.”

After they leave trembling, Stiles waits until he hears their bikes starting and going away before looking inquiring at Peter.

“They’re gone. That was impressive, sweetheart.“

Stiles deflates and lets himself fall to sit on the ground, facing Peter. “More like exhausting, you mean.“ He lifts his fist half-heartedly in triumph. “Told dad that letting me watch The Godfather would be useful in the future, though.” Peter and Allison snort.

“Do you really think they’ll leave?” Allison asks softly as she sits beside him.

“Yeah, I’m pretty sure. They aren’t really loyal to Deucalion, they just keep each other safe as well as they can.“ Stiles squeezes one of Peter’s feet between his ankles, his face thoughtful. “The problem here is that if he catches them defecting… but that’s not _our_ problem.”

“What now, then?“

Stiles sighs, pained, and starts straightening himself up and pulling Allison up with him. He takes Peter’s hand when he offers it. “We need to talk to Derek… and Scott. This information changes the game play completely.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some feedback, please?


	14. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*
> 
> Proofed by @Nineofour :)

Chapter 13

Stiles eyes Peter as they leave the depot. The man is uncharacteristically silent, as if he’s pondering on something and it makes Stiles curious instead of wary, which is pretty confusing and surprising but he takes it in stride. They’re almost at the jeep when Allison speaks, placing a hand on Stiles’ shoulder and making him halt. Peter, a few steps ahead of them, stops too.

“They waited specifically until you were alone.“

“Huh?”

“I had to go back to my locker during French class, no one was around, and they didn’t attack me, but you randomly go to the toilet in the middle of one class and they jump you? Both happen to be outside class at the same time?“

“My thoughts exactly," Peter agrees silkily, face dangerously blank. "Which means there’s another thing Deucalion wants."

“They were watching us at the bank,“ Stiles concludes darkly, looking around again warily.

He doesn’t really think any of the alphas are observing them now, otherwise, they would have helped the twins... Or maybe not? Stiles admits that even knowing what he knows about them right now, he's confused by their dynamics. Something tells him that they don't operate like a normal pack by any means, and not just because they are all alphas. They obviously have a hierarchical structure where Deucalion is on top, followed by Kali and Ennis, and with the twins at the rock bottom, way below them and quite evidently used like expendable pawns. Or that's what the twins said about their situation in any case. So would it be that strange if Deucalion let them be cannon fodder if it suited his plans?

The answer is a rotund no.

However, it’s also true that if all that happened wasn’t a really weird coincidence that the twins took a chance on but a premeditated attack ordered by Deucalion, he most likely thought Stiles no match for them and didn’t send any kind of backup. He’s probably waiting for the twins to come back triumphant at this very moment or he already suspects something went wrong.

Which makes this really, really bad because in one swift move Stiles has made himself seem more of a threat to them than he really is at the moment. And while he would normally be all in for using the misconception to his advantage, in this case he's completely sure that being thought a weakling would have been for the best. After all, if it wasn’t because the twins were trying to scare him before capturing him and because Allison saved the day, he would have been hopelessly outmatched. Which means that when Deucalion (who doesn’t know what happened and if the twins keep their word and are smart, never will) tries again to snatch Stiles he’s going to go big, with no possibility of going home.

Crap. 

“Fuck,“ he curses. Now they have to change the plans, because there’s no way he’s going to the loft and gather together there so many things the alpha dude wants. He has to call Derek… who doesn’t have a phone at the moment and he doubts very much he went to buy one with his long lost sister at the house. Awesome. Which means that he will have to be the one to call Erica and Boyd too… and Scott… and if he doesn’t pick up this time either… His stomach twists. “Do you have Isaac’s number?”

Peter arches his eyebrow at the manic triumphant expression on his face. “Curly doesn’t let Derek buy him one.”

“He doesn’t have one either?!“ Stiles gapes.

“Nope.“ Peter even goes as far as to pop the p, his tone a clear indication of how stupid he thinks that is.

“You’ve got to be kidding me. Can’t you, I don’t know, howl at the moon," Peter and Allison, almost synchronized, look pointedly at the clear afternoon sky, “and somehow communicate a time and meeting place? Like one long howl means at seven, three short ones at… and where the hell do we meet that they won’t be able to listen in and attack us?“

“I think we’ve become redundant,“ Peter mutters sarcastically as Stiles starts talking to himself, and Allison presses her lips to contain a snort.

“Let him be,“ she mutters back at him and Peter narrows his eyes at her at the almost order. She’s utterly unfazed. “Last time he was like this, he rambled for an hour straight about Naruto and the ash thing happened.“

“What.“ 

“Japanese cartoons about ninjas.“

“Ninjas.“

“With ridiculously overpowered techniques that defy the laws of physics.“

Peter adopts an expression that conveys clearly skepticism and _watch it, baby Argent, not only our truce is fragile, but do you think you can troll_ me, _that I was born yesterday?_ But then he looks at Stiles, who is pacing back and forth while muttering and gesticulating angrily. A small ashy creature is pacing in the air just behind him with exactly the same body language as its creator, tiny sparks of electricity cracking around it.

“Actually, that explains so much,“ he concedes dryly.

“… and there’s no way around it, I have to call Scott.“ Stiles deflates finally, sagging exhausted and looking upwards to the sky with a long-suffering expression.

“Ah, teenage drama,“ Peter sighs as he takes out his phone and starts dialing.

“You have his number?“ Stiles asks incredulous but somewhat hopeful.

“Of course I do! Who do you take me for? One never knows when the need of tracking his phone will arise, after all.” Stiles gapes and Allison looks for a moment like she wants to make a remark about that, but contains herself. “Scott, my ex wayward and still useless beta! I call bearing…” Peter exclaims as the call connects. He then separates the phone from his ear and frowns at it. “He hung up, how rude.“

Stiles facepalms and resigns himself to his fate. Allison tries to not find the absurd situation funny and fails miserably.

_The person that you are calling is currently unavailable. Please try your call again later._

“Seriously?!“ Stiles exclaims aggrieved, looking at his phone as if he wants to stomp on it out of sheer frustration. “Okay, this is it. Time to pull out the big guns,” he spits out as he punches at his phone with more force than the strictly necessary. “Dad? So, hypothetically speaking…”

—

There are two very easily differentiable generations at the police station: the old crowd and the rookies. Despite what the nomination suggests, it’s actually not a classification based on experience, time on the force or age, but on if the person in question has been touched by the baby cop or not.

Those in the old crowd category can be differentiated from the rookies with the help of two very distinct things: one, they get (and still find funny) the _his face broke my wrist_ joke and its numerous variations; and two, the word _hypothetically_ makes them tremble like newborn kittens and have the almost irrepressible urge to hide under their desks.

John still remembers Brooks' face when on his very first day the rookie saw Jones throw a pen under his desk and make an aborted move to do just that. And only aborted because John was just beside him and grabbed him before he could.

Anderson, who has been retired from the force for nearly eight years now, swears that whenever he gets some inexplicable chills running through his back, he knows _The Word_ has been used and he hides in the basement with the excuse of some manly time with his carpentry.

Petersen, the toughest lady John has ever had the pleasure to work with, has always found the whole thing hilarious and never failed to want to jump into the fray like the fearless madwoman she is. She still calls when she gets the chills like Anderson, except she wants to know if she can help because she's bored and wants to spice up her life. Oh, how everyone mourned when she retired five years ago.

But back to _The Word_.

The first time Stiles used it, he was a five-year-old toddler. He was sitting at the table munching mulishly his peas, not happy at all because he was grounded and he hadn’t been able to talk his way out of trouble. Sheriff Jenkins, Anderson (his partner at the time), Petersen and some other deputies John had invited over for dinner and a game later were finding it terribly funny.

Now, if anyone asks John about it nowadays, his first reaction is always to snicker when he remembers the toddler’s glare and furious munching of his peas. Especially since he _hated_ peas with a passion at the time but he was trying to keep his impressive (for a five-year-old) glare up instead of making disgusted faces at said peas. But at the time? Having to go to the school in the patrol car with Anderson snickering all the way, to pick up his wayward son from the principal’s office because he had insulted his kindergarten teacher, wasn’t fun for John.

Not at all.

So, there he was, his little munchkin, in his raised chair and with his pouting lips (even as he chewed), when he suddenly turned his attention to his boss, Sheriff Jenkins, and narrowed his eyes. He then let his spoon rest gently on the edge of his plate instead of slapping it angrily like a normal toddler would and took a deep breath.

But when had Stiles ever been a normal toddler? John should have known what was going to happen… and yet, he would have never been able to guess what was coming. He learned afterwards to always be prepared for the impossible where Stiles is concerned.

“You’re the big boss, right? The one who gives the orders to my dad?” he chirped and, heck, John wanted to dig a big deep hole and bury himself in it at his mates’ hilarity. He just knew he wasn’t ever going to hear the end of it.

“That I am,“ Jenkins answered seriously, pressing his lips to contain his laughter.

God bless the man and his infinite patience, John thought at that very moment, just as Claudia, the traitor, suffered a sudden coughing fit and excused herself to check on the dessert.

“Hypothetically speaking,“ Stiles went on and, if he wasn’t so mortified, John would have appreciated the beauty of his guests’ flabbergasted expressions at the big words of his kid, “what would it mean when the big kids go to your teacher and always say they like to be happy?”

“Ah…” 

“And she always answers that…“ Stiles looked upwards as if trying to remember the exact words. “Happiness is enjoying the little things, appreciating what you have and realizing it’s a choice you can make today?”

“Ah…”

“And she always gives them a little baggie after that. Like, this big,“ Stiles made a little rectangle with his chubby little hands, still pouting. “And it’s filled with candy, and I said I wanted to be happy too and she won’t give me candy because she said it's special candy for big kids.”

“Ah…” 

“That’s a lie, right? Right? There’s no special candy just for big kids, right?“ Stiles concluded triumphant but nearly out of breath, and took a deep breath. “So, if that hypothetically happened, that would make her a liar and a stingy person, right? Right?”

There was a sepulchral silence at the Stilinski’s home. Jenkins, gobsmacked and gaping, nodded slowly.

“I told you, daddy! It was totally justified! I’m not grounded anymore, right?“

The very next day, they finally arrested, caught in flagranti delicto, the drug dealer they’d been trying to track for two months already, and thus the baby cop moniker was born.

The _hypothetically_ word situation only got worse (or better, depending on how one looked at it) with time.

“Hypothetically,“ John repeats dryly as he goes towards his office.

Tara looks wide eyed for a moment and as if she’s resisting the impulse of calling back all the meagre units they have from patrol, and Collins and Donner are really confused because they were just talking to Jones and the man has suddenly disappeared. John would snort if he wasn’t so preoccupied trying to think a way of making possible what Stiles wants.

If he tweaks the patrol schedules a little bit, and then sends Collins and Jones out too… keeping only Tara and Donner here… and if he calls both sets of parents with the excuse of filling out some paperwork and because he needs to… And with the Hales and that Isaac boy...

“Be at the station in an hour more or less and bring me something to eat with Allison. Have Hale wait for his nephew and niece before entering,“ he says finally, with the door to his office already closed.

He needs to make some calls.

—

John has Donner attending to Erica’s parents in one of the offices when they arrive and Tara is with Boyd’s in another. Meanwhile, he makes a show of asking the teens some questions when he’s not in reality. Stiles arrives boisterously shortly after, Allison in tow, with something to eat. When Peter, Cora and Derek arrive, he gets them in his office to, apparently to others, wait for him while he finishes with the teens. Scott is the latest to arrive on his bike with Isaac.

He avoids looking at Stiles, who does exactly the same.

“You better make this quick,” John says softly when everyone is present. “I doubt it’s going to take them long to fill out the paperwork."

“You’re a god among men,” Stiles states solemnly and John rolls his eyes. “So, here is what we found out.“ And he launches into a hasty explanation of what they got out of the twins. “See, dad? I told you letting me watch The Godfather was a good choice.”

“That’s funny, because I remember clearly forbidding you from watching exactly that movie… and I don’t recall ever lifting the ban.”

“Ah.“

“Also, please, don’t admit to psychologically torturing two of your classmates in front of the sheriff… in the middle of a police station.“

“I never admitted to doing that, I just said that I persuaded that information out of, I mean, I persuaded them to facilitate that information. I also made a completely innocent and unrelated remark about a movie that…”

“I forbade you from watching?“

Stiles grumbles and throws a dirty look at the snickering Isaac. He really wants to flip him the bird. Then, the teen tilts his head to the right, as if he’s listening to someone talking.

“Derek says to get back on track and Peter to stop… downplaying his interest in you?” Isaac pipes in after tilting his head for a moment.

“Yes, Stiles, stop,“ Allison frowns, obviously not very happy about that either.

“I wasn’t!” he blusters. “I was just going for a quick explanation!”

“Bullshit,“ Isaac pipes in again quite gleefully at the same time as Allison, before adding, “says Peter.”

Stiles flails frustrated.

“Back on topic,“ he grunts, a pink tint on his cheeks. “What do we do about this?”

“Stay out of it, it has nothing to do with you,“ Isaac recites, obviously channeling Derek. “It’s too dangerous.”

“It’s way too late for that, dude,“ Stiles retorts frowning. “Those twins targeted me specifically at school. They had ample opportunity to attack each of the others throughout the day, and they went for me.”

“Ah, don’t call him dude, and if you had listened…”

“You’d be a drowned mutt in my school’s pool, so shut the fuck up and stop underestimating me," Stiles growls, eyes fixed at a point behind Isaac. John, who is just keeping silent and taking in all the information to think, raises his eyebrows in surprise at his vehemence. “I’m tired of your bullshit, Derek. I get it, okay? You don’t want anyone hurt and, really, I appreciate the sentiment and all that, but you need to stop.“

“Ah, and what do you suggest…” His eyes dart to John and he licks his lips nervously. “I’m not repeating the last part.”

Stiles takes a deep breath, trying to collect his thoughts. He spots one of the office’s doors opening at the far end and Tara stepping out of it, but stopping at the threshold. He throws at her a begging gesture, motioning to Erica and Boyd with a hopeful expression, and she blinks. Then she rolls her eyes and goes back inside. He instantly sobers. Score.

He eyes everyone around him, considering how to proceed. Erica leers at him and even if it's half-hearted compared to her normal attitude, his temper ignites.

To hell with it.

He doesn’t give a damn about the pack per se, but he knows that if it doesn’t stabilize, the territory will be always seen as a weak one, and that will put his family in danger. He won’t let that happen.

“Wipe that stupid expression from your face,“ he snaps and she recoils. Isaac jumps a little, startled, and Boyd is wide eyed. He doesn’t bother checking the others’ reaction. “I’m fucking tired of all of you, you need to grow up.”

“How dare you…“

“ _You left me to die._ ” Her mouth snaps shut abruptly and she averts her face shamefully. Both Boyd and Erica look terribly guilty, but Stiles can't find it in him to gentle his tone. “And, even before that, you gave me a concussion with a part from my own jeep and left me unconscious in a dumpster. Do you get what that means? _I could have never woken up_."

“I…“

“ _No._ ” He rubs his neck frustrated. Allison’s hand on his back, his father’s stony expression and the growl he heard from Peter (and he’s two hundred percent sure it was him) just a moment ago ground him. “You get no more Get out of Jail Cards.” He takes a deep breath. “I’ve saved all of you. Every. Single. One. You’re going to listen to what I have to say. _You owe me._ “

No one makes a move to break the ensuing silence. Electricity is cracking on his skin and he makes a herculean effort to rein his power in, if only so that he doesn’t hurt Allison without meaning to. And to avoid getting caught too, he supposes.

“You two, what are you planning on doing?” he asks, tone aggressive. They don’t dare to speak and he barrels on. “Are you planning on leaching from Derek forever? Because I may not get along with the guy, but what you’re doing is disgusting.”

“I don’t understand?” Erica whispers wide eyed.

“Of course you don’t,” his voice cracks like a whip and Erica, Boyd, Isaac and even Scott flinch. “He hasn’t taught either of you and, even worse, he’s too proud to ask for it. _But you haven’t bothered asking about what you are either._ Because you only care about getting back at those who bullied you, and being popular and all that stupid shit. Never mind that you’re being careless as hell and endangering an entire world that has kept hidden for a fucking reason. But sure, go on, be lacrosse stars and cure magically from one day to another from a sickness,“ he gives them a sarcastic thumbs up. “Good job!”

“You don’t understand,” Isaac snarls.

“It’s you who doesn’t,“ he snarls back, his face contorting with fury. “You think you people are the only ones that have suffered? Fucking wake up. _You don’t know shit._ ”

“They tortured me every single day,“ Erica growls, her hand in a white knuckled fist around Boyd’s shirt. The teen himself has his gaze averted and his lips pursed, as if he’s remembering something.

“And now you’re torturing them back. And also people that did nothing to you. Beautiful. And stupid, by the way, risking exposure. And what’s more, cruel, but it’s not like you care that you’re torturing Derek either, right?“

“What are you talking about?!“

Stiles explains succinctly and with all the contempt he can, about the pack bonds they are ignoring, and how’s that affecting Derek, because it’s obvious he never will do it himself. Every single thing he’s learned about that in the book Peter lent him spills out of his mouth.

They are so pale and horrified when he finishes, that Stiles gets a sick feeling of success. He’s being merciless, but he doesn’t care one bit right now. He lets them stew in that and turns to Scott. He flinches when he notices Stiles’ focus on him. 

“And you, how much more are you going to risk your mom like that?“

“What?!”

“You’re nearly an omega right now, and it will only get worse with time.“

“I wouldn’t hurt my mom!”

“ _You nearly killed me that day you lost control, and you weren’t even in the process of becoming an omega yet then._ “

Scott’s eyes turn amber as he growls. “I’ll never be in his pack and let him order me around!”

He hears an answering growl from inside his father’s office at the same time his dad looks about to intervene. Allison has her taser out discreetly.

“Stay where you are, Peter,“ he orders him at the same time he motions at his father and Allison to hold it. “Look at you, about to lose it because I said something you don’t like. And you say you’re in control? Hah!”

Scott snaps out of it as if he’s been hit. He looks at Stiles wide eyed again, as horrified as the rest.

“Let’s not forget about you, oh alpha of alphas,” he continues, fixing his gaze on the far end offices again. “Fucking grow up. I don’t care if you weren’t trained for this, you’re the alpha now and have people and a territory under your protection. _Fucking learn already_. Stop acting as if you have to take everything on your shoulders and use your damn allies and, for fuck’s sake, make more. Reach out to other packs or whatever, but do something besides scowling. _Teach your fucking betas_. Fucking spell it out as if they’re stupid, even, because they clearly are, with the way they’re acting.“ It says something about how Stiles’ words have affected them, that no protests or indignation rise at the insult. He spots Tara exiting the office and he smiles at her faux happily. “You know what a pack should be, teach them that. You know how a good alpha should be, copy that. Get a decent house in the middle of town, fuck, you’re sitting ducks in that damn loft. Get a fucking phone already, and one for Isaac too. And Cora, if she doesn’t have one. It shouldn’t be this fucking difficult to locate you or each other, for fuck’s sake. If any of you is not willing to do that, then fucking leave.” He takes a deep breath, waving at Donner as he exits the other office. Erica’s parents are very near and he hastens to finish, lowering his voice. “Let’s make things clear, ok? If you don’t get your fucking act together and either my father or Ally or Peter get hurt because of that, _I’ll fucking kill you myself and end the problem, understood?_ “

Erika and Boyd's parents reach them then and they have to stop talking. After both teens and their parents leave, Stiles, Allison and Isaac wait while John makes a show of spending almost fifteen minutes with the Hales in his office. Derek and Cora exit said office with matching scowls and Isaac follows them outside. Peter looks as if he doesn’t want to leave, so Stiles makes sure to brush covertly against him as he passes, and the man’s lips twitch slightly.

After everyone has finally left, John ushers Stiles and Allison into his office. The moment the door closes, he draws his son into a tight hug and Stiles sags into it, suddenly exhausted. Allison lets them have their moment, her worried eyes never leaving Stiles.

“Well damn, kiddo. You see now why I didn’t want you to watch The Godfather? Like you need more tips about to how to be terrifying," John jokes half-heartedly and Stiles chokes out a laugh. 

“I really need to start with the runes,“ he sighs wearily.

“See? You really don’t need The Godfather to sound terrifying.” Stiles laughs, swatting at his dad's back. John tightens his hug before letting go. “Now, what did you bring? I wasn’t joking about the food, you know.”

"Veggie burgers."

"Oh, come on!"

"Kidding," Stiles singsongs and Allison giggles.

" _Brat._ "

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooo... I've been suffering from a major writer's block these past weeks. It may also have something to do with my work load during that time too, to be honest. My brain was completely fried, and I couldn't bring myself to write a single word even though I had this chapter mostly planned... :( Seriously, except for the first 500, I've written everything else today... -.-U
> 
> Some feedback, please?


	15. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*

Chapter 14

Stiles is in a mood.

He went to bed yesterday emotionally exhausted and this morning he’s no better. He has woken up feeling fed-up, burnt out from having heart to hearts with people he doesn’t or shouldn’t care about, and tired of needing to spell out things that are obvious to idiots that are going to do whatever the hell they want anyway, reducing all his efforts to exercises in pointlessness.

All in all, he’s tired of talking all together.

Shocking, he knows. Blabbermouth Stiles Stilinski doesn't want to talk, someone call Mulder and Scully, the world may very well end today and all that jazz. As surprising as it may be, even he has a moment now and then when he just wants to bury himself in research or a game and not interact with people in general.

“Stiles, Allison is going to be here soon!“ His dad calls from downstairs, his voice almost muted but still intelligible. "Just coffee is not an acceptable breakfast!"

Stiles eyes the books Peter lent him mournfully. He has already deciphered them fully, and the perspective of starting to experiment with the knowledge is so tempting right now... A day at home, no people, no talking, just Stiles lost in his own mind...

He sighs resigned. School is going to be a torture today, he just knows it. Just the thought of having to endure Harris being a dick, as usual, makes him want to dive under the covers and plead sick. Enter having to see Scott, Isaac and possibly Erica and Boyd and the urge to just hide under the bed is almost irresistible.

Stiles hears his dad climbing the stairs and he doesn’t even bother pretending to rush to change out of his Batman pajamas. When the knock on his door comes, he only grumbles in answer.

“Kiddo, did you fall asleep aga…?“ John cuts his sentence abruptly as he takes a good look at Stiles, who is sitting sideways on the bed, as if he started rising from it but couldn’t make the effort to finish the action.

John has a pair of comfy pants and a faded BHPD t-shirt on, his hair is still mussed and he's clutching his coffee cup like a lifeline, as if caffeine has been a must today to wake up. Stiles recalls vaguely something about a double shift that starts in the afternoon at the sight.

“I’m trying to wallow in my own misery,“ he explains plainly, a clearly visible pout on his face, and, just for a second, his dad’s lips twitch. His own twitch in response too.

John finishes opening the door, entering the room fully. He approaches the bed and sits beside him with a grunt, passing an arm over his shoulders. “And how’s that going?”

“Meh.“

“Just meh?" John takes a deep swallow of coffee and sighs contented. "Now, don’t sell yourself short. From here, I’d say A+, kiddo. You got the downtrodden posture and pitiful expression down pat.“

“You know that I don’t do anything by halves,“ Stiles drawls and John’s lips twitch again. 

After a minute in companionable silence, Stiles sighs tiredly and John squeezes his shoulder in response.

“Hale came by this morning,“ his dad says suddenly and Stiles blinks surprised. “Peter,” he clarifies.

“Peter?“

“Yeah. And he came through the door, if you can believe that,” he adds dryly, which prompts a soft snicker out of Stiles. “And seeing I’ve caught Allison climbing to your window so many times already, you can get how surprising it is that someone is willing to use the actual door and ring the doorbell to boot.”

“Preposterous! _He didn’t!_ “ Stiles can’t help but fake being scandalized. It’s half-hearted at best, but his dad rolls his eyes in response, obviously amused.

“He said to let it be a surprise, but I’m thinking it may actually help motivate you to get out bed, so… He left a bag for you. A present, he said. If you want it, it’s in the kitchen,” he bribes him as he gets up with another grunt.

“That’s playing dirty,“ Stiles grumbles, still pouting. “Using my curiosity against me…”

“Is it working?”

Stiles raises his arms imperiously, exactly like a toddler, and John snorts as he reaches to help him up and pull him out of the room, then down the stairs and into the kitchen when the teen won't walk on his own.

Sure enough, there’s a brown bag sitting on the counter. Stiles sits on a chair and picks it up carefully. As he expected, there’s a book inside. Or leather-bound journal, to be precise. Stiles caresses the covers lovingly and takes notice of the details edged on it. It’s obviously handmade but not very old. He opens it carefully and…

Baking recipes?

He blinks surprised for a moment, not expecting the content at all. Oh, but it is gorgeous. It’s completely handwritten and the calligraphy is beautiful, loopy and cursive but very clean. The illustrations are colorful and mesmerizing, a work of art, and the attention to detail is astounding. Each recipe comes with at least an illustration and a detailed and clear explanation of the process. In some of the more complicated recipes, those explanations come with a little drawing of how the dough or whatever is being prepared should look at that point.

"Your breakfast, son," his dad says pointedly and he digs in absently.

Dreamy meringue pie, death by chocolate cookies, relaxing green tea pastries, exciting fudge brownies, explosive white chocolate mousse, fast vanilla and caramel pudding, lovely cinnamon rolls, mom’s cheesecake, dad’s almond bar,… The names are cheesy (pun not intended) but they sound so good…

His hands itch for a whisker and a bowl, and he eyes the cupboard where he keeps all his baking tools stored longingly. Allison chooses that very exact moment to honk at the front of the house and he lets his head fall with a thud on the table, groaning pitifully.

He feels his dad’s hand on his head momentarily before he goes to the door to signal her to enter instead of waiting for him at the jeep. Because she’s as silent as a ninja, the next thing he knows is that she’s right beside him.

Her hug is cotton candy, warm cinnamon milk and all sort of good things rolled into one, and he’d stay like this forever. It gets even better when she shakes a paper bag in front of him and a wonderful smell reaches him. He unearths his head to find a couple of pecan and fudge brownies.

Stiles is going to build an altar in her honor and proclaim himself the very first believer and priest of the goddess Allison Argent. Bow to her greatness.

“You went to Bananas?“ he asks impossibly fond before his entire demeanor turns devious. “What did you actually want to buy?”

“Bright and early,” she chirps before admitting chagrined. “I asked for those peanut butter bars you like.”

Stiles can’t help but to snicker and she slaps his arm even as she rolls her eyes, lips twitching. Her attention gets caught by the illustrations on the journal and she makes an appreciative sound.

“That’s your cookbook? I didn’t know you knew how to draw. So beautiful!“

“Nah, mine is much messier than this. It’s actually a present from Peter,” he explains with a warm feeling on the stomach.

“So?“ she inquires curiously.

“Mmm?”

“What is it really about?“

“Huh?”

“It’s coded, right? Like the other books?“

“No?“ What starts as an affirmation ends like a question and he eyes the journal suspiciously. She’s right, after all, everything Peter has lent or given him up until now has had a second meaning, one way or another.

Allison is patiently silent for some minutes as he tries to find any hidden message on the text. Finally she states almost apologetically from where she’s still leaning on his back and hugging his shoulders. “We’re going to be late, ducky.”

He groans and only her tight grip on him prevents him from abusing his head against the counter again. He resigns to his fate and raises from the chair, pulling her with him. He reaches for the bag to leave it at his bedroom and then blinks when something makes a sound inside. He opens it again to find a little magnifying glass. He shares a look with Allison.

“Told you,“ she says smugly and he rolls his eyes as he opens the journal again. “No, no, no, no.” She pulls him backwards and marches him towards the stairs. “You’ll have to look at it at class, come on.”

“You’re so cruel, snuggleduck,“ he grumbles even as he starts climbing the stairs to his room with her still hanging from him.

“Thanks, ducky,” she chirps.

Not even five minutes later, they’re ready to go. As they pass his dad on the way to the door, Stiles already trying to decipher the mystery of the baking journal and Allison steering him so he doesn’t crash against any walls, he stops them.

“Remember I have a double shift later, kiddo,“ he reminds him, terribly amused by the close call they’ve just had with the wall. “You’ll spend the night, Allison?”

“My dad wants to do some intensive training today and tomorrow,“ she explains apologetically and John frowns.

“I don’t think I like the idea of leaving you alone very much…”

“I’m actually thinking of inviting Peter to stay for that same reason, if you don’t mind?“

“Okay, better.”

“Okay?“ Stiles blinks surprised.

“You are… pack, right?”

“Yeah.“

“Okay, then,“ he nods. “Apart from the normal rules, don’t blow up the house, capisce?“ John looks meaningfully at the journal in his hands. “Or, if that can't be avoided, at the very least don’t blow yourself up so I can ground you for the rest of your natural life for destroying the house.”

“Daaaadddd,“ he whines. “I’m not going to…”

“I doubt Peter will let him do that, anyway,” Allison interrupts.

“My thoughts exactly.“

“You both are the worst.”

“Yeah, yeah. Promise me you won’t be ruining anyone’s life out of irritation today either?”

“I would never…“ John raises his eyebrows skeptically. “I promise to not get caught?“ He compromises pouting and John snorts.

“Don’t worry, I have baked goods and I know how to use them,“ Allison assures him and John laughs softly.

“I’m not giving these back,” Stiles frowns, embracing the bag with the brownies protectively.

“I never said I only got those from Bananas. Come on, I’m driving.“

Stiles sighs and lets her steer him to his jeep. Brownies or no brownies, it's going to be a long day.

—

Erica and Boyd strut into school as if their faces aren’t plastered on every notice board. While Boyd remains his stoic self, it’s clear that Erica has decided on the cocky approach as her armour, because she even goes as far as to pick one of the fliers from the board, inspect it and make it a ball to throw it to the trash without even looking, to the astonishment of their peers.

He shares an unimpressed look with Allison as she pulls him into the building. He’s in a better mood than how he was when he woke up, but he still has no patience for Erica's (or anyone's, to be honest) shit. It’s obvious to him that his words yesterday did nothing and really, he shouldn’t be this disappointed.

“I need to find Danny,“ he murmurs and Allison raises her eyebrows in askance as she rummages through her locker. To her confusion, he's looking mournfully at the bag containing the brownies.

“What for?“

“I need the facial recognition program he used to track the alpha pack to the vault. I don’t like being blind and physically searching for them would do more harm than good.”

She looks at the bag dubiously. “And you’re going to bribe him with brownies?”

“He loves anything chocolate, so it’s a start,“ he defends himself. “You don’t mind, do you?” he then asks hesitantly, waving at her the bag from Bananas.

“Of course not,“ she smiles at him and he leans on her smiling. “I have more…”

“Find a room!” a jock jeers at them after knocking Allison and almost Stiles too into her locker, making crude gestures with his hands, and he narrows his eyes dangerously.

“Remember,“ she pulls at him, “no ruining lives out of irritation today. And it's not like I can't tase his balls into disintegration if I want to anyway.”

“First, you can't disintegrate something that doesn't exist to begin with, and second, I only promised to not get caught,“ he grumbles and her lips twitch.

“Danny,“ she says.

“Don’t think you can distract…”

“He’s there.“

Stiles turns, and, sure enough, Danny is walking towards them, talking to another two guys from the lacrosse team. He nods minutely to Stiles and Allison as he passes them and they nod back. Stiles makes no move to talk to the other teen.

“I thought you wanted…?”

“Not in public,“ he explains in a hushed tone as he starts walking to their first class. “It looks like the twins really left, but I don’t want to risk it, you know. I don’t want anything to splash him. Whoever put that mountain ash line is obviously not a werewolf and I never saw anyone else but the alphas at the vault.”

“Not even on the traffic cameras?“

“Never noticed anyone suspicious at the moment and I can’t enter the database to look again, I just see what’s happening in real time. So that person is a complete unknown.”

“How then?“

“I don’t really know. Maybe I can feign going to Coach at practice today? I really do want to talk to him about leaving the team, after all.“

“What? Why? I thought you liked it?“

“Meh?“ he says with a grimace and a so-so gesture. “I mostly did it for Scott, to be honest. Benchwarming all the time sucks and I have better things to do with my time than that.”

“Mmhm… We could text Lydia and get her to talk to Danny…”

“And maybe he can hack into my laptop like he did with the security feed of the vault…“ he muses. “Yeah, it could work, I think.”

“There’s an eight hour difference between here and England, so we’ll have to wait until she sees the text, though.” She looks at her phone’s watch pensively. “It’s three in the morning there… Well, I’ll send it now anyway.”

“Wait,“ he stops her. “Don’t outright ask for it, just in case.”

“You think they may have hacked our phones or something?“

“They must have watched us somehow when we went to the vault…“ he muses just as they enter the classroom. “They obviously didn't use the feed, because the lights didn’t return, so no electricity… And Peter said that his hearing was working as well as it did before the resurrection thing, and he didn’t hear them there. Hmmm... But I'm not quite sold on the idea of them hacking our phones either, to be honest, because that wouldn't have let them watch us at the vault either.”

“Maybe, I don’t know, they left a camera behind to record the whole thing or that druid ally they seem to have did some kind of magic to keep them undetected…“ she muses as she takes a seat, followed closely by him.

“I hope that's what happened, because I texted Danny directly about hacking the security feed of the vault,“ he says as the bell rings. “Better to be careful in any case, so let's think about it for a bit more before we make a mistake.“

—

He spends first and second period keeping half an ear on what the history teacher is blabbering about to avoid getting caught while he reads the baking journal. Allison rolls her eyes fondly when the teacher calls him, probably suspecting he's not paying attention, and he answers correctly anyway.

It’s sneaky, so, so sneaky that he almost cackles when he finds the hidden message. If Peter hadn’t left the magnifying glass, he’d most likely never have found it. Inside the carefully done illustrations there are extra ingredients and, what he thought were pictures to clarify how the dough should be at that point, in reality are used to mark the point where said ingredients have to be added.

Apparently, if you do the normal recipe, you get a really nice lemon meringue pie, but if you add the secret ingredients… well, the cheesy names make more sense now. Stiles is really a dork, because he finds the puns incredibly funny.

He discreetly takes out his phone.

 **To Peter:** _Come by later?_

 **To Peter:** _I’m baking._

 **From Peter:** _Not the death by chocolate cookies, I hope._

 **To Peter:** _What about the explosive white chocolate mousse?_

 **From Peter:** _I have to admit I'm quite curious about the explosive nature of those._

 **To Peter:** _Right????_

**To Peter:** _If this didn't have the potential to backfire spectacularly, I'd send it to Jackson._

 **From Peter:** _Now that would be a sight._

 **From Peter:** _I'm pretty sure your lady friend would object strongly to that, though._

 **From Peter:** _She did save him with the power of her love, after all._

Stiles covers a snort because the text seems innocuous but he knows the man is being sarcastic. Allison looks at him quizzically and he grins.

 **To Peter:** _She can be quite vindictive too, so yeah, better not poke at the sleeping dragon._

 **To Peter:** _Shame, though._

 **From Peter:** _I'm sure that we could find a way to not get caught if you want to do it that badly, sweetheart._

 **To Peter:** _This is Lydia whom we're talking about, she would totally find out._

 **To Peter:** _Then both of us would die and unless you can pull a resurrection, take two, I'd rather not go through that._

 **From Peter:** _Who says I can't?_

 **To Peter:** _You need a banshee for that._

 **To Peter:** _And I'm quite sure Lydia is too intelligent to let that happen to herself again._

 **To Peter:** _Also, the minus one hundred million percent chance that she would help you voluntarily would have gone down to minus one hundred million and one after offing her douchebaggy boyfriend._

 **To Peter:** _I could be persuaded to find a way to send him the gassy shouffle, though._

 **From Peter:** _Airy shouffle._

 **From Peter:** _And I don't think that one is to give someone gas._

 **To Peter:** _Really?_

 **From Peter:** _You obviously haven't read what the secret ingredient is._

 **To Peter:** _No?_

He pulls the journal out again and places it under his textbook. Then he searches for the shouffles and tries to be covert as he leans over the page with the little magnifying glass.

 **To Peter:** _Oh._

 **From Peter:** _Yes, oh._

 **To Peter:** _Now I really want to try that one..._

 **To Peter:** _Having the AP somehow eat them would solve so many problems..._

 **To Peter:** _The clean-up would be a bitch, but it might be worthy anyway._

 **From Peter:** _So bloodthirsty._

 **From Peter:** _I wholeheartedly approve, sweetheart._

 **To Peter:** _Anyways, also gonna experiment with runes today._

 **To Peter:** _So we don't have to think a way to sneak in those shouffles to actually get somewhere with the AP, you know._

 **From Peter:** _That would be more convenient, true._

 **To Peter:** _But I'm in the mood for chocolate cookies in any case._

 **To Peter:** _Can you pick something for me at the supermarket before coming?_

 **From Peter:** _What do you need?_

 **To Peter:** _Eggs and cinnamon sticks? The rest I have._

 **From Peter:** _Be there at 4?_

 **To Peter:** _4:30._

 **From Peter:** _Ok._

Stiles debates with himself for a moment before going for it.

 **To Peter:** _Can you stay the night? My dad has a double shift and he’d prefer if I wasn’t alone._

 **From Peter:** _I don’t think your father was exactly thinking about me to correct that situation._

 **To Peter:** _He was actually._

 **To Peter:** _His exact words were that you’d, at the very least, not let me blow up myself so he could ground me for the rest of my natural life for destroying the house._

 **To Peter:** _We’re pack, after all, and he knows that. It’s no secret._

There, he’s said it clearly (again), because he has the feeling that Peter needs to hear those things even if he’d never admit it, and, as he said this morning, he never does things by halves. He eyes the teacher carefully before turning his attention back to the phone. It's best to not make the man feel cornered, though.

 **To Peter:** _Be extremely careful until we locate the AP, ok?_

 **From Peter:** _You worry too much, sweetheart._

 **To Peter:** Of course I do.

After three full minutes, he figures he's not going to get a response to that and he sighs satisfied, relaxing on his seat. He’s laid it thick, but no thicker than Peter up until now and he's pleased with how the conversation went.

Hallelujah! Something is going well finally!

—

After a long day spent avoiding the pack and Scott (which they must have been doing too, because he's been too successful to be normal otherwise), and barely enduring his classes, wanting nothing more than to go home, Stiles feels about to burst out of his own skin. At least his last class of the day is one he enjoys, Criminal Justice, or he would be hard pressed not to skip it altogether and be done with school for the day. The only downside of it is that Allison has French, so they have to split up.

He’s halfway through the period when a solution to the whole communication with Danny problem comes to him out of nowhere. And, seriously, they have been needlessly complicating things and he feels a little stupid for not having thought of this solution first thing.

When class ends, he waits for Allison at her locker, tapping his foot impatiently. The moment he spots her, he steers her in the direction of the changing rooms near the lacrosse field, explaining to her quickly what he’s about to do.

As he expected, Coach is in his office already and none of the players have appeared yet. He quickly locates Danny’s locker and, while Allison is on the lookout outside, he slips a note inside trying to avoid touching its door on anywhere near it. It's a shame, but he’ll find a way to give the brownies to him later. Or something else to bribe him really, because the brownies aren't going to last that much.

It takes him less than one minute to do that on his way to the office so if the alpha pack really has someone else inside school, it will look like he just went to talk to Coach about leaving team. And even if one of the alphas is suspicious and comes later to check, there’ll be so many overpowering scents in the room that Stiles is almost completely sure they won’t able track what little he may have left on Danny’s locker or its surroundings.

His feeling of success gets soured by talking to Finstock, though, because the man doesn’t give more than a token protest about Stiles quitting the team. He seems more miffed about leaving him with just Greenberg as a back-up player than about letting Stiles go and while the teen logically _knows_ that he's just a benchwarmer in the end, it sucks. Just what he needs to boost his morale today, awesome.

“Do you want to train with me in the mornings?“ Allison asks the moment he’s beside her, passing him a lemon bar with a loving smile and putting her arm around his waist.

A temple, he thinks reverently as he passes his arm around her shoulders. Not just an altar but a whole temple.

“You’d teach me your awesome ninja skills?“ he snickers jokingly, taking a bite and humming delighted. “Are you sure you want to risk your life like that?”

“I think it would suit your body type,” she answers seriously and he blinks surprised at her solemn tone, pausing mid-chew. “It’s centered on speed, strategy and using the opponent’s weaknesses against them. And long-range attacks of course. The last thing you already have it covered with your ash, but you can try your hand with other weapons too, if you want. God knows we have an entire arsenal at home for you to test if you feel like it.”

He swallows the lump in his throat along with the lemon bar bite he still had in his mouth before talking, voice thick. “Well, I did say I was taking your knives.”

“Not the knives!“ she whines and her sniggers finally.

“I'm _so_ taking the knives."

"You're so cruel, ducky."

"Thank you," he singsongs with a wide smile.

Definitely a temple. A huge, beautiful temple with high stone pillars and filled to the brim with flowers and water fountains and with fudge pecan brownies as offerings. And lemon bars, peanut butter muffins, caramel custard cake...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hell weeks are over!!! *Dances around. I should go back to my normal schedule for a while :).
> 
> Some feedback, please?


	16. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work inspired by cywscross. If you haven't read her works go check them out, they're all fantastic! *-*
> 
> Also, thanks [@ssree](https://tmblr.co/mv0kDALmvHLT__cnOTN8WUA) for proof-reading this.

Chapter 15

Stiles leaves Allison at her house with a cheeky wave at her father and gets home with ten minutes to spare before Peter is set to arrive. His dad’s cruiser is still parked in front of the house when he pulls into the drive, which is surprising because he thought he would be on his way to the station by now or already there. He jogs up to the front steps, happy to catch his dad still at home.

“I’m home!“ he calls as he opens the door, hoisting his school bag higher as he stores his keys.

“So soon? I thought you had lacrosse practice,” his dad replies from the kitchen, where he’s probably having a quick coffee before leaving for work.

“I quit. I was fed up with benchwarming,“ he elaborates before his dad can ask as he closes the door. “On another note, though, I’m going to start training with Ally some mornings… or evenings, we haven’t actually worked out a schedule. I thought you had an afternoon shift?”

“I have to be at the station at five.“

“You’re early th…“ he starts saying as he crosses the hallway and begins climbing the stairs to his room. He isn’t even three steps up when he stops abruptly, looking downward with squinting eyes, lips pursed and hands on his hips. “Dad?”

“Yeah?”

“Tell me you aren’t pointing your gun at Peter.“

There’s an almost non-existent pause.

“I’m not pointing my gun at Hale.”

Stiles bites his cheeks long-suffering, backtracks a few steps without actually turning and then sticks his head into the kitchen. His dad is sitting at the kitchen’s table with Peter in front of him, both of them with a coffee mug in their hands. Peter is looking intently at his dad, face serious, but, at the same time, something tells Stiles he’s infinitely amused by the whole exchange that just happened. His dad’s gun is right beside his empty hand, not exactly pointing at Peter but very close to do so.

Stiles has no doubt that it was aiming at the werewolf before he asked. He has the sudden mental picture of his dad moving it minutely to the side with his index finger when Stiles asked about it, eyes locked into Peter’s.

“Seriously?“

“What? I’m not.“

“Right now, you mean.“ John shrugs unrepentant, taking the last sip of his coffee, and Stiles flails, deflating almost instantly. His pout makes John’s lips twitch. “Soooo… dad? Quick question before you leave.“

“Your inocent expression is working as much as mine did on you, kiddo.“

“Which means not at all?” Stiles smiles brightly.

“Exactly.“

“Awesome!”

(Sarcasm has always run thick in the Stilinski family.)

Peter lets out a tiny cough and raises his coffee cup to cover his twitching lips. After a short stand-off, John rolls his eyes.

“The question?“

“Choose your pill: plausible deniability and ignorance or complicity in a crime and knowledge?“ He takes a seat beside Peter, plastering his thigh to his nonchalantly. He looks upwards thinking, making a show of counting with his fingers. “Or more like two or three crimes?”

“So nice, these choices…" John says dryly. "Spill.“

“I’m getting a facial recognition program installed in my laptop… apart from the live traffic camera feed I already have, of course.“

“That’s how you tracked those alphas before?“

“Yeah. Wasn’t actually thinking on going to their hideout that fast… and unprepared, and stupidly unplanned, and... you get the idea," he grumbles frowning, feeling the irritation rising just remembering what happened. "But, well…” He shrugs. “We dealt with the situation as well as we could given the circumstances.”

"You did," John concedes plainly even though he's clearly not happy about his son having been put at risk, especially when he wasn't near to help and protect him. “But let's avoid something like that happening again ok?“

"Yes, please. Let's avoid that," Stiles agrees, not at all up to a repeat performance.

"So we have five alpha werewolves-"

"Three if Ethan and Aiden really left."

"Or got caught leaving," Peter points out.

"Or got caught leaving," Stiles agrees.

"Are you implying that-" John sighs, closing his eyes tiredly tired and trying to take a sip from his already empty mug. He aims a disgruntled glare at it and Stiles contains a snort. "Of course you are. Wonderful. I'll be on the lookout for two bodies." He rubs his mouth and sighs. "And that other person? The one that put the mountain ash?"

“Still unknown. I only have access to the live feed and I never saw anyone else but the alphas there.”

“I went back to the vault today,“ Peter adds, “and I distinguished five different scents apart from the ones from Derek’s puppies. Two of the twins, and the rest of them I already had smelled at the hospital. Whoever or whatever that person is, they know how to conceal their scent. My best bet is on them being a druid. Witches have never gotten that trick quite right and it always leaves a residue behind.”

“Okay,” Stiles butts in before his father can get a word in. “Say what? You went there alone?” Peter raises his eyebrow and opens his mouth, no doubt to answer with a witty remark. Stiles doesn’t let him have even the chance. “ _No_ , you don’t get to sass me on this.“

“I can handle…”

“I don’t doubt you’re resourceful and all that shit, but what if that unknown had trapped you, mm? You have no way of breaking a mountain ash line. And cool, you’re intelligent, but you admitted you’re not at your best right now, and there’re still three alphas out there that could overpower you in a frontal assault. Especially if they covered their scents like I suspect they did when we were at the vault, and you didn’t see them coming.“ Stiles takes a deep breath. “You know I’m right. You wouldn't like if I went on my own either, would you? So no more going solo unless you can’t avoid it or it’s a too good opportunity to let it pass. But always, _always_ , check with someone before and after, ok?” Peter’s face is blank, but not in a bad way, and Stiles lets him mull over what he just said. He turns frowning to his dad, who is looking like he’s struggling to not let the amusement show. “Speaking about that… Don’t look so amused because it goes for you too. When you leave through that door, you’re going to be the most vulnerable of us, and I hate it. At least until this alpha pack is dealt with, you need to…”

“May I remind you I’m the father here? That I have a gun?“

“And I’m the son, and please remember that having a gun didn’t help you at the hospital,“ he rebukes him sharply before pursing his lips and looking at his clenched hands. “I’m just asking to know more or less where you are, both of you, to know where to start looking if something happens. I’m compromising to do the same. Something like a group chat? I’m not being a worrywart, this is just the sensible thing to do.“ He bites his lip and swallows thickly. “I won’t accept a no for an answer.”

“Okay,“ both men answer somberly and almost in tandem after a moment.

“Good. Give me your phone, Peter. I’m going to put in my dad, Ally and Mr. Argent’s contact. I know you don’t like him, but it doesn’t hurt to have his contact just in case of an extreme emergency. I don’t know about you, but I’d call even Satan if something happened to any of you.”

“Not far off,“ Peter quips darkly, pocketing the phone.

“Here’s Peter’s, dad,“ he continues, lips twitching at the werewolf's almost pout.

“Back to the topic of the sheriff’s son committing a crime,“ John says after clearing his throat. "Explain."

“I’m not letting them catch us unawares again and if we go searching for them, they have the advantage. It’s the only solution I could find to our problem? Maybe this way we can find their new hideout and make a pre-emptive strike.“

“Pre-emptive strike?“ his dad asks, lips pursed. Obviously not liking the sound of it, but willing to listen to his reasoning.

“If what the twins told us is true, they’ve already killed more than three entire packs: Kali’s, Ennis’ and the twins’. Which, if we assume them to be at the very least two people each (alpha and beta), that means they’ve killed three people already. And, I repeat, that’s assuming that there were only two people on each pack… and I know for a fact that the twins’ wasn’t conformed just by them and their alpha because they told me so. Also, they sort of implied that there have been some that refused to kill their own pack and… well, you can guess what happened.“

“I know of at least two packs,“ Peter’s adds in quietly and Stiles squeezes his knee. “With a body count of twenty-three in total.”

“Which means that reasoning with them is out of the question,“ John surmises darkly, crossing his arms. Unbidden, a memory of what Matt Daehler did comes to his mind. “And, being werewolves, arresting them is futile, because no normal cell will hold them up… and who knows who they’d hurt on their way out. Assuming we managed to arrest them at all.”

“Exactly,“ Stiles nods. “And scaring them out of town would be like sentencing others to death… apart from having the risk of them coming back to finish what they started, possibly with more members added to their pack.”

“Dammit,” John mutters, pursing his lips and frowning. He reaches to rub in between his eyes, hoping to ease the ache that is steadily growing there.

“Yeah, I know,“ Stiles sighs, slouching on his seat. “I like it as much as you do, believe me, but I’m not going to wait for them to hurt any of us.”

“And they _will_ try. They’ve already showed us they don’t care about collateral damage so long as they get what they want,“ Peter adds, lips curling at the prospect.

“Okay, we’ll cross that bridge when we come across it,“ John says after a long silence. “For now, I have to go to work. If I have to leave the station, I’ll text you. See if you can create that group chat thingie, kiddo. As for me, unlike you, I do have access to the database of the traffic cameras, so I’m going to see if I can identify that unknown. Also, I’m going to need the password to your computer. That way I’ll be able to keep an eye on it when you’re at class. Is it still strawberry blond goddess?”

Stiles flails, flushing up to his ears. He wiggles spastically for a moment, embarrassed sounds escaping his mouth, before he calls defeat, hiding his face in his arms. “No," he whines pained, "it’s…” He mumbles the rest and Peter snorts amused, especially so when the actual Pikachu makes an appearance to prance around his head. “Stop it, Peter! No one would guess it’s that, ok?”

“Care to say it louder for us without the enhanced hearing?“ John drawls, ignoring his embarrassed groan.

“PikachuRules. The P and the R in caps.”

“Well, you’re right, no one would think about that.“ Stiles throws a sideways triumphant look at Peter and John fights to reel in his amusement. “Well, don’t change it, ok? If you have anything you don’t want me to see, keep it out of the desktop. I don’t want to see any porn pics.“ Stiles groans and John snorts as he holsters his gun. He gives his son a quick kiss on the crown of his head and a shoulder squeeze, before tossing as he heads to the door. “Remember about trying to not blow up the house, ok?”

Stiles grumbles petulantly.

“Strawberry blond goddess?“ Peter lilts when the door closes. "Well, it's better than..."

“Shut up.”

—

“What.“

“What what?“ Peter inquires deceptively nonchalant from where he’s been intently watching Stiles mix the ingredients for the death by chocolate cookies.

“Spill.”

“I don’t know w…“

“Peter.”

“Mmhm?“

“ _Peter._ “ Stiles finally lets go of the spatula to start making balls of dough. He has a tray with a baking sheet at his right and the oven is preheated. He’s also making pasta bologna and that’s nearly done too. Peter has been staring silently the whole time with Stiles’ laptop running in front of him. So far, Danny hasn’t made his move, but Stiles isn’t expecting him to until practice is over anyway.

There’s a stagnant silence for some minutes that Stiles makes no move to break, letting the man have his own pace. He keeps working with the dough, making sure to make eye contact now and then with him. He’s pretty sure he knows what’s bothering the man, because it would rankle Stiles too, but if this whole pack thing is going to work, both of them are going to have to make an effort.

Trust, the deep kind, doesn’t come easy for any of them. Communication is tied up in the first place or is a close second.

Peter wants him to be pack so he's continuously trying to prove himself to Stiles. It’s not that he doesn’t appreciate the gestures. He does, really. But it’s different to make things for another person because you like them or love them or care for them (or any given combination of all of the above), and you know it makes them happy (which in turn makes you happy or at the very least leaves you satisfied), than to do those things because you think you’ll be cast aside if you don’t.

Stiles knows the feeling intimately. And when the people you’re doing those things for either ignore them or reject them, or even take them for granted, it’s even worse. Which is why he gets why Peter is holding back, trying to protect himself if things go south.

He looks at the man and sighs inwardly. He’s asking too much, it’s too soon. Even if he hates doing this kind of thing, just like with Allison, he’s going to have to be the one to take the first step.

He did say he doesn’t do anything by halves… and he’s decided to keep Peter.

“Look,“ he starts after he places the tray in the oven and then tastes the bologna, “I don’t know how things worked in your pack before, but if they were like this? It’s obvious we’re going to do things differently. We don’t sacrifice or use people as pawns in this pack. We don’t have to prove our value by doing stupid things like gathering information alone, and much less without telling anyone we’re going to brave our enemies former lair.“

“Our pack,“ Peter says emotionless.

“Our pack,” Stiles nods firmly.

“You’re blunt.“

“I see no point in going in circles.”

“Well then, and who is in this pack?“

“That’s a tricky question, isn’t it?“ he answers, taking a seat in front of him.

“Ah, is it?“

“Depending on how you look at it, I suppose. Our pack? You and me. My family? My dad, Allison, Scott if he gets his act together, you. Pack is family, after all. Adjacents? Chris Argent, because of Ally; Melissa McCall, because of Scott.”

“And if you had to choose who to save? Because I’d always choose pack over anyone else.“

“What’s the situation? Because I’m your pack, but you all are my family.“ Peter raises his eyebrows. “And that’s an unfair question and you know it. Are you and my dad hanging from somewhere and the fall won’t kill you? Is there mountain ash or something that would affect you more than it would affect the other one I’m supposed to be saving? If there’s nothing like that, then the answer is always going to be both. Somehow, I’ll manage both, no matter what it takes.”

“That’s an incredibly naive view. I never expected that from you, sweetheart.“

“It’s my answer for the people I care about. Take it or leave it, Peter. And choose now because I already care about what happens to you and if you’re going to decide this is something you don’t want after all, I want to know now before I care even more and this hurts me,“ he finishes bluntly. “I care about my family, and then, by proxy, about whom my family cares about. The rest can go hang themselves. If it came to that, I’d choose Scott before Melissa, Ally before Chris, even if that would cost me their friendship. At the same time, I’d try to save them for them. If you asked me to save Cora or Derek, I would. And I’d choose you over them in a life threatening situation, even if I’d tried to help them too. This is who I am.”

“And if I asked you to kill them?“

“If they hurt you, or were threatening you? I would. Just for kicks? No.”

Stiles raises from the chair and turns off the stove just as the alarm for the cookies rings. He takes them out of the oven, looking them over to check if they are done and the times on the recipe are right. He then tastes the bologna again and adds more salt to the sauce. Peter is silent the whole time.

“You know what he did,“ the man speaks finally. “What he does constantly now.”

“What are we talking about here? The leaving part or the Kate part? And of course I know what he does now, you saw what I did in response to that.“

“ _Both,_ “ Peter almost snarls, ignoring the final part of his statement.

“So you want me to kill him?” He keeps outwardly calm, even though he knows his heart is pounding and Peter can hear that clearly.

Peter makes to speak several times but stops himself every single time. It’s obvious there are many conflicting thoughts in his mind and that he's trying to sort them out. He finally sighs, deflating.

“No. I already killed whom deserved to be killed for that.“ Laura, Kate and her accomplices, Stiles fills in the blanks in his head.

There’s more he’s not telling, Stiles knows. Probably things that happened with his former pack or even with Derek himself, because Stiles is not stupid and he can read between the lines very well. But there’s a lot more to Stiles that he hasn’t told Peter either. Things that probably the man can read about him in his actions too, but that they don’t address, content to let things run their course naturally.

“Okay,“ he says simply.

Peter eyes him, face blank. “You would have,” he whispers then, like a prayer. There’s wonder and relief in his voice.

“He’s threatening you constantly, he hurt you.”

“But you don’t want to.“

“But you asked.”

“And you’d hate it.“

“I would.”

Peter sighs again, closing his eyes briefly. “And that’s why I wouldn’t ask you that.”

“I know.“

“Oh, you do? Haven’t you heard?“ Peter smiles shark-like and taps his fingers on the counter. “I’m a pirate! I lie, I kill, I steal, I manipulate, yo-ho.”

Stiles looks at him, eyes intense, wondering if he should go all in into the pool now that they have finally dipped in their toes. It could backfire spectacularly and spook Peter badly, or it could be what they need. He decides to risk it.

“To outsiders. You do that to outsiders, to non-pack. Which makes me want to know what the hell did they do to you, that you’d finally do that to your own pack.“

“ _Pack,_ ” Peter snarls despectivelly, eyes flashing blue. He contains himself almost instantly from going on. It’s a clearly visible struggle.

“Exactly. And one day maybe you’ll tell me more. Because you’re like me in that aspect and it’s taken me a lot of shit to actually consider cutting off ties with Scott.“ Never mind his dad or his mom. The thought hasn’t even crossed his mind with them. “I can’t even think about what would take me to a point where killing my family was the thing to do.“ He takes a deep breath. “You asked for loyalty, companionship, pack. You gave them first and I’m giving them back. Now the question is: are you going to actually accept them?”

Peter’s features darken, but not threateningly so. Stiles feels like he’s on uneven ground, because he didn’t expect this. It’s like the man is setting himself for failure, and that’s so against what he knows about him that he doesn’t know how to react accordingly.

“Do you even know what you’re saying, Stiles? Because there’s no turning back from this. Backing from it would be a betrayal and you know how well I deal with that. So think before…“

“Cut the crap already,” Stiles snaps, temper igniting. He's deeply offended and he doesn't even try to cover it. “Betrayal? What the fuck? If you thought I was like that, you wouldn’t have approached me in the first place.“

“I wouldn’t have?“

Stiles is getting mad but he manages to keep himself in check, even though he getting progressively more and more irritated as they back and forth for several minutes. It’s testament of how frustrated he’s becoming with the whole conversation that his ash is moving restless up and down his arm, even if it doesn’t feel charged with electricity because of the tight leash he has on it.

Peter keeps pushing his buttons and Stiles rebukes all what he says, increasingly exasperated and frustrated, and even irate. The man’s voice is even, but Stiles is pretty sure he’s raised his quite a bit. Both of them are like glued to their seats.

It suddenly dawns on him and he cuts himself abruptly to glare at the man disgruntled. Peter goes silent and doesn’t say any other word when Stiles sighs and rubs his forehead tiredly. He gets up from his seat, walks around the table until he’s right beside Peter, and then leans on the counter, arms crossed.

He’s seen Peter in action when he really wants to be cutting and hurtful, and this display, although infuriating, isn’t up to his normal standards. It should have been the first clue for Stiles to notice there’s something more to this whole conversation.

He wants to call him on it, he really does. What was he expecting to happen? That Stiles would physically shut his mouth like Derek would? That he’d kick him out of the house? Make him leave to avoid having to deal with him? Or that he'd leave himself for the same reason? Or maybe that he’d lose his patience and hurl verbal abuse at him or something like that? It’s pretty insulting.

(He has pushed his buttons really well, but none of those have even crossed his mind.)

“Not nice,” Stiles says simply.

“I’m not a nice person, sweetheart,” he drawls.

(Not entirely true, Stiles thinks.)

“I’m not nice, either,” he answers plainly.

(Not entirely true, Peter's twitching lips seem to say.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some feedback, please?


	17. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp, this took more than a year. I’ve lost count of how many versions of this chapter I’ve written… and how many times I rewrote each one of those. Sigh.
> 
> Thanks [@ssree](https://tmblr.co/mv0kDALmvHLT__cnOTN8WUA) and [@nineorfour](https://tmblr.co/mukyLNts2OHZG9R4qM1ik0g) for proofing this.

Chapter 16

Stiles risks a glance over the brim of his book at Peter and then returns quickly to the page he was reading when their eyes meet and he gets an arched eyebrow from the man. He barely contains the need to facepalm and wince at his own lack of cool and tries to cover it by shrugging as if nonchalant. The answering huffed snort makes him humph and turn his nose up in the air.

As much as he can with it still buried in his book to cover the flush he can feel rising in his face and the top of his ears.

(Smooth, Stilinski. Real smooth.)

But he can't help it, he can't read Peter at all right now. It's weird and confusing to some degree after having been so open, so raw, just a moment ago, but at the same time not. It feels as if they took a step forward and then backed that same step again right afterwards. Maybe even two, because Peter has never been this blank-faced in his presence. Or, actually, if Stiles recalls well, in anyone's presence. Peter is always sassing -provoking, testing, manipulating- people in one way or another. He uses his words, body language and facial expressions as weapons and he does it terrifyingly well. It never fails to get a response from the people around him, Stiles included, and now its absence rattles him.

Stiles stills suddenly. His eyes dart briefly towards Peter again and then go back to the page. He bites his lip and frowns contemplatively.

Maybe this isn’t a step back after all? Peter uses his words, body language and facial expressions as _weapons_. To defend himself, to get what he wants, to attack. _Weapons_. He’s used them against Stiles before, so it's not that he's an exception. It's not that he thinks Stiles harmless, useless or inconsequential either. Even back then, in that parking lot, he thought Stiles had the potential to become dangerous, a threat to him. Enough of a threat, in fact, that he wanted to have Stiles on his side and he _offered_ when could have just _taken_. That not only hasn’t changed but it’s worse.

(Stiles couldn’t trap him and make him choke on mountain ash with a mere thought before.)

But he's blank-faced now. Or rather... relaxed? Maybe?

Stiles sighs, slouching on his seat, and contains the need to throw a dirty look at Peter for being so damn difficult. He must do a lousy job because the man smirks at him self-satisfied.

"You're such a dick," Stiles grouches long-suffering and Peter's grin widens even more.

Smarmy bastard.

Of course, there's a chance Stiles is reading him wrong. With Peter it's hard to tell, because he has more layers than three millefeuille combined and even more masks, but Stiles is pretty sure that it's not a front he's putting up this time. The ball is in Peter's court in any case. Stiles will have to accept whatever he chooses to do and react accordingly.

He reaches for the baking journal again and catches Peter's eyes again. The man's eyebrows go high as he eyes the already finished death by chocolate cookies -the normal kind, he knows, because he's seen Stiles take a bite and then perform an awkward dance because his mouth was burning- cooling on the tray with an skeptical eye.

“Just because I can't risk Lydia finding a way to murder me remotely," and she _would_ , of that he has no doubt, “it doesn't mean I can't use this.”

“Hmm,” Peter hums, lips twitching. The way he reclines in his chair makes Stiles want to grumble about the unfairness of it all. Because while Stiles is slouching, you can't call what Peter is doing _that_. "What are you planning?"

“Revenge, what else? A petty one but equally effective in this case given whom my target is,” Stiles answers flippantly and Peter snorts. "But no, no more baking for now. It's for Monday, so I'll bake on Sunday. I don't bake any substandard goods even if it's for revenge, you know," he sniffs. "Right now, runes. I really need to crack this before the alpha pack makes another move. Like hell I'm getting chased around like a mouse again," he grumbles. "Pity I can't just poison them all and be done with it."

"Pity indeed," Peter agrees, terribly amused by the pout Stiles is sporting.

An alarm goes off on Stiles' phone and he startles. Then he remembers what it is for and he shoots from his seat towards the TV, leaving a bewildered Peter behind. The familiar intro to La Dulce Impostora is already running, so he hurries to set the recording so he doesn't miss anything. There's a pointed silence at his back and he feels himself starting to blush.

"Shut up," he grouses.

"I didn't say a word," Peter lilts.

"Stop judging me, dude," Stiles grumbles with cheeks that are starting feel really hot. "La Dulce Impostora is super addictive, ok? There's a dying abuelita that is the cutest, most charming thing ever... Seriously, that woman is a queen. All hail Queen Isabela, may she reign forever over us lowly mortals," he preaches with an earnest expression. "But yeah. There's abuelita Isabela, a fake cancer that turns out to be true and an even faker pregnancy that doesn't... but kinda does? Depending on how you look at it, I suppose..." he hums thoughtfully, turning to set the recording. "And amnesia, lots of amnesia. It's so fucking ridiculous. But finally, after everything, they're about to elope and Camila Valeria is going to ruin it all. Again. And it's the fifth time. I can't take it anymore, ok? I just want them on a beach in Bali happily drinking coconuts so I can be free and go back to my life, ok?"

"Well, I didn't really understand half of what you said. Congratulations, that must be some sort of record." Damn the man and his sass. Relaxed or not, Stiles served him that one on a silver platter and even Stiles himself wouldn't have let it pass without answer. "Also, I hate to be the bearer of bad news-"

"Yeah, your face tells me you're in despair right now," Stiles quips back drolly.

"-but according to this site, that one still has more than ten episodes left."

Stiles gapes, a horrified expression rapidly taking over his features. "You're shitting me."

"I... _shit_ you not," Peter answers seriously.

A beat, two beats, and then Stiles is running back to the table to look at the laptop's screen. He doesn't slow down as much as he should and he collides against Peter's back with a soft grunt. He doesn't pay it any mind and he reaches for the laptop. Sure enough, there's more than ten episodes left... Thirteen to be exact.

"Oh, god, no" Stiles whispers, the whine escaping him unbidden. For a moment he feels really tempted to just read about how it ends because _thirteen one-hour episodes yet to go_... and so far the only thing that hasn't happened on that storyline is a zombie apocalypse. Seriously, there's even been an attempt to overthrow the current government! Just. No. Ok. No, he will not. He'll stick right to the end. Like a captain. "I will go down with this ship," he pronounces darkly, prompting a surprised laugh from Peter.

Stiles contains a petulant pout. He raises his eyebrows and narrows his eyes at the man, daring him to say anything about it. Peter smirks and looks about to speak (no doubt to sass Stiles) but suddenly, windows start opening and closing on the screen without either of them touching a thing and they both blink surprised.

"Yesss! Danny, my man!" Stiles exclaims happily, throwing his arms up in the air. Peter grabs his elbow before it impacts with his nose and rolls his eyes but doesn't say anything otherwise. "Awesome! Now we'll be able to track those fuckers without risking our necks. And who knows, I may still get to poison them."

Peter laughs again and Stiles smirks in answer.

\---

Much later after Danny stopped doing his own kind of magic on Stiles' laptop, Peter is dividing his attention between something on the screen and a notebook he brought with him. Stiles is kinda itchy to know what's in there because everything Peter brings has been fantastic so far, but he knows better than to try to take a peek because Peter hasn't offered. Privacy and all that shit.

Stiles has the strong feeling that Peter is testing him. For what purpose exactly, he doesn't know, but he's pretty sure that he is. First with how he provoked him into a fight and now with this. And there have probably been more tests that he hasn't even noticed. In any case, if Stiles finds that notebook unattended later he won't be surprised.

(It all comes down to trust, doesn't it?)

Well, he'll cross that bridge when he stumbles upon it. For now, he'd better focus on runes or at this rate he'll be werewolf chow and Peter's tests won't matter anymore.

And, god, it's so frustrating.

Runework sucks. Big. Sweaty. Donkey. Balls.

He knows the actual runes and would be able to draw them with his eyes closed by now. That's not the problem. That was the easy part, actually. The problem is that the placement in the actual item matters. Placement relative to the other runes matters. Size relative to the item AND relative to the other runes matters. Meaning? One tiny mistake fucks it all.

Meaning that it's been one hour already and he has done nothing more than waste a lot of paper and bite the cap of his pen so much that it looks like a war casualty.

Because, on top of that, just because a rune has an established translation doesn't mean that the effect that rune will produce matches it. Because two runes together get a complete different meaning than those two runes separately. And if they're linked it's even worse. _The meanings don't add up, they transform each other_. Hence, runework sucks. Big. Sweaty. Donkey. Balls.

Stiles reaches for his phone and then takes a selfie, sporting an epic pout. He hits send and then lets his head fall onto the table with a beautifully resounding thud. Peter snorts.

(Also, Peter is a dick that finds too much entertainment in witnessing Stiles' suffering.)

(Or maybe this is another test.)

Without looking, he makes a ball from the paper with his latest failed experiments and throws it in the man's direction. With his luck, it probably falls short, but it's the sentiment that counts, right?

"You're such a dick," Stiles grumbles.

"Yes, we've already established that," Peter drawls, the tapping of his fingers against the keyboard never stopping.

And he flashes him the finger for good measure, because he doesn't need good aim for it to reach the man. Peter snorts again and Stiles pouts sullenly into the table.

Ok, ok. How do you eat a bear? Bite by bite.

He sighs and comes out from hiding reluctantly. He looks at the page where he has noted down the few functioning arrays that can be found in the many books about runes that Stiles has, and decides that trial and error will it have to be. Sorry, Master Yoda, as sacrilegious as it sounds, your teachings hold no place in here. He may get grounded for the rest of his natural life for blowing up the house, but it's not like he has any other options at this point.

He grabs a clean sheet of paper and looks at it thoughtfully. He may as well start with the simpler ones. According to his first chosen runework's specific diagram, the array should cover one third of the item he wants to apply it on. But the question is: is that proportion regarding the size or the mass of the item? Does this mean that Stiles will have to become a master at calculating the mass of things on the go? Because that could pose a big problem.

"Excuse me, Mr. or Ms. Enemy-of-the-Week, can you tell me your height and weight? And what did you say was your last meal? And the quantity of said meal? You wouldn't be constipated per chance, would you? Oh, I'm just curious, you know, ADHD, I get hung up on the strangest things. And since you're killing me anyways, why not share? Oh, you don't speak English? Yo hablo español si lo prefieres... Oh, you don't have vocal cords at all? My apologies. I'll just make an estimate, thanks for your time anyways and sorry for the inconvenience," he pipes softly in a falsetto voice. He studiously doesn't look Peter's way. "Because that would go well..."

His phone chimes and he can't help but cackle at Allison's answering selfie. She looks filthy, sweaty and her face is so red that it gives the impression that she's completely out of breath. She's sporting an equally epic pout and it's hilarious.

Stiles takes a deep breath after he lets go of the phone and shakes himself mentally. Ok, whatever, no big deal. He'll find a way like he always does. First, he has to make an array work to begin with.

Because nothing ever comes easy -and if runes are such a rare practice as the books say, which suggests a high level of difficulty-, he assumes it's mass. Ok, awesome (note the sarcasm). So volume and density. The paper is a rectangular form, so the volume would be length x width x height. And as for density... The Internet it is. He stands up and goes to the laptop Peter is using. The man looks at him curiously but turns the screen to face Stiles. A quick search reveals paper's density, which gives him the last tool he needs to calculate the mass, and in turn the size the array should have.

Now, where to place it? Up, in the middle or down? Centered, on a side or on a corner? Left, center or right? Because the texts say nothing about that and if the size of the array and each rune regarding each other are so important, Stiles doubts the placing doesn't matter.

Experimenting it is.

(Here's to hoping that all his limbs remain in place by the time he's done.)

He picks up the pencil and copies the array right on the centercenter of the paper. He concentrates on activating it and gets a cloud of mountain ash to the face for his troubles when Pikachu comes out to play so to speak. He sighs and has to concentrate on getting him back to his skin instead. He tries again and gets the same exact results. After the sneezing attack ends, he pouts but gives it another go. By the tenth time this happens, he's ready to tear his hair in frustration and the ash is moving around agitatedly from limb to limb and then even to his face, which gives him another uncontrollable attack of sneezes.

"Are you for real?" he grunts frustrated at Pikachu and his ears seem to flop down, just like dogs when they don't know what they're doing wrong because they think they're obeying what you told them to do.

Stiles blinks. Maybe he's not directing his spark belief whassit (what, he doesn't have a name for it) at the paper but at the ash instead? He hums thoughtfully and makes a soothing gesture at Pikachu, prompting him to return to his skin again. He closes his eyes and concentrates. His magic works with belief, right? So believe he will. He opens his eyes and looks at the paper again.

"Yes!" he crows happily when he picks up the sheet of paper from a corner and instead of flopping down like it should, it remains rigid. "Look at this, Peter! Hah! I'm a genius! Bow down in my mighty presence!"

"I'll be right on that, give me a minute," Peter deadpans drolly. He waves a hand towards the oven trays. "Here, meanwhile have a cookie."

"I made those," he grunts at the man, his face falling into an unimpressed expression.

"Are you saying they're bad and that's why they don't qualify as a prize for your success?"

"Don't you dare!" Stiles gasps scandalized. "Everything I bake is superb!" Peter raises an eyebrow. "Well, there might have been a few FUBAR situati-" Peter raises the other eyebrow. "Damn you," he grumbles. "Gimme the damn cookie. I deserve it. Because my cookies are totally prize-worthy. You heard that? Totally and without a doubt. Nothing beats them."

"Maybe add a glass of milk to be sure? And two cookies instead of one? Added value, you know. It was a big success after all," Peter quips, picking up the ball of paper Stiles threw at him before and throwing it with all the rest pooling at Stiles' feet without even looking.

Smarmy bastard.

"Stop dissing my wonderful cookies," Stiles grouches, throwing a narrow-eyed glare at the man.

"Me? You wound me, sweetheart," Peter replies amusedly, getting up to prepare a couple of cookies and a glass of milk and put them in front of Stiles.

"Smarmy bastard," Stiles mutters, this time aloud, as he takes a bite. "Just for this, you're not getting any-" Stiles voice becomes an intelligible grumble when he hears the tattletale crunchy sound to his right, where Peter is leaning to pick up the paper with the functioning array.

Stiles humphs at Peter, whose smirk widens, and he rolls his eyes. Then he covers an amused grin because he knows the man's impressed because he nearly forgot to leave the paper behind when he went back to his seat... and because he snatched another cookie on his way.

Stiles goes back to the paper and sets off to finding out if the array can be turned off. It takes him a few tries but it's possible. If he erases the array, it stops working, it seems. Or is it because he stopped believing it would work? He'll have to ask Peter to participate later. In any case, awesome, success! Now more tests, he thinks rubbing his hands excitedly.

He writes the array, turns it on once again and then he sets it aside. He spreads more sheets around the table as he starts changing the placement of the array on them, activating it as soon as he writes it and noting down the time on a separate notebook. That way he'll kill two birds with a stone and he'll be able to check a few things: the time it lasts once activated and how many he's able to activate at the same time.

(Because he knows that spark works with belief, but is this power of his finite? Druids depend on outside forces to practice runework and rituals but where does a spark's power come from?)

Once he has twelve variations of the placement, he tests them against each other. Then he makes size variations and, after that, size and placement variations.

Two hours later, he has reached several conclusions: yes, size matters; yes, placement matters; yes, his spark is finite to a point.

The size sets the range of effect of the magic and the placement sets the point of impact. So, with the hardening array he's testing right now, if Stiles sets right in the center a smaller array than the one-third ratio the book said to use, the edges of the paper don't harden and flop down like they should. Stiles feels giddy with the possibilities this brings to the table. Of course, this experiment was done on a pretty simple form, it will obviously be more complicated with other more irregular ones. But it's a start, right? Stiles has a feeling that he won't be needing to calculate everything's mass exactly, just have a general idea to work with, unless he's doing a very precise work. Of course, to get to the point of not needing to calculate it every time, he'll have do at lot of testing and practicing.

And as for his spark being finite... Even with the snack he had before (which he suspects Peter gave him on purpose because he somehow knew he'd need the extra energy and it kind of makes Stiles want to grin), he's ravenous right now and it has nothing to do with the hour it is. It feels like when he comes back after one of those gruelling lacrosse practices and he'd eat the fridge's contents... and then the actual fridge itself. So this means that using it tires him as exercising would. It remains to be seen if working out (so to speak) will raise his stamina or if his power is a set value that he'll have to work around.

All in all, not bad for two hours of work. Now that he knows some of the rules (because he's sure he'll find more as he goes) he can start experimenting. But _first_.

"Dinner?" he pipes looking at the lasagne like a man would at water in a scorching hot desert.

As if on cue, his stomach emits an epic growl that lasts way longer than it should and he feels himself start blushing. Peter smirks at him.

Stiles flips him the finger again.

(Peter is way too smug about that, the smarmy bastard.)

\---

"Mmm," Peter hums contemplatively as he takes the first bite.

"Mmm?" Stiles replies, already on his third bite. So sue him, he's starving, ok?

"Mmm," Peter continues humming, almost reluctantly.

"Mmm, huh?" Stiles replies again, smirking.

"Mmhm," Peter says as if unimpressed.

Stiles grins and Peter rolls his eyes.

\---

Just after dinner, Stiles gets to work with the second simplest array he has available. The first one was a hardening one (to put it simply, the explanation in the book was way more technical and complicated) and this one is an elasticity one. Whether it augments or reduces elasticity remains to be seen though.

Just like with the hardening one, this array consists of four runes. Stiles' guess is that that's the simplest it can get. Because probably just putting one rune would be too open and thus, the effect would be unpredictable and uncontrollable. So basically there's a primary rune and then at least three secondary ones that delimit the first one. The placing and the size respecting the primary rune define the extent of the effect they have on it. That's probably why there are some subtle differences between both of the arrays that he has, even if they have the same diamond structure.

Ok, good, he can work with that. And since he now knows what effect the placing has, he writes the array exactly on the center of the paper and activates it. He picks it up and looks at it thoughtfully. At first glance there's no apparent change on it. Then he pulls from both ends.

"Whoa!" he exclaims surprised when it stretches out like gum.

Well, it's a little harder than gum and unlike it, when he stops pulling it immediately goes back to its original form with no evidence of what happened left behind. It has a limit of how much it can extend though, so Stiles guesses that the runes alter the original characteristics of the item they were placed on, as opposed to giving it a new set value. So if the original item had been stretchy to begin with, it would have extended even more than the paper. Conclusion: arrays alter the items exponentially.

(Oh, god, the possibilities.)

So the primary rune is elasticity and its size right now is the perfect size to have an effect on the whole paper, but what if he plays with the secondary ones? From what he has gathered, those only alter the primary rune, not the actual item itself.

He has two different arrays with the same structure and, save from the primary rune, the same runes in that structure. And those secondary runes have the same size respecting the primary rune on both arrays. What do those runes do? Because the meaning they have doesn't shed any light on that.

So if he gets the left side one and makes it bigger, what happens? And what if he changes the one at the bottom? Or the one on the left? What if he changes two of them at the same time? Or the three? What if...

\---

Stiles startles a little when the lights of the kitchen are suddenly on. He turns to look at Peter perplexed, but the man isn't paying him any attention at all. He squints around and takes in the sun's position in the sky. He hadn't even noticed he was starting to struggle to see.

He lets the pen he was keeping in his mouth fall into his hand and looks at the mess he's made. Maybe it's time to tidy up a bit, he thinks grimacing.

Well, it was worth it, he supposes... or at least a necessary evil.

Some of his tests were a complete bust and some weren't. He now knows what each of the runes in this particular array is for and how their size relative to the primary affects it. He also knows that, at least in this kind of structure, all the runes need to have the same orientation or it won't work. Also, this kind of structure is to alter the physical characteristics of the item it's placed on. -And it _has_ to be an object. All the books were _adamant_ about that, about runes not being used on living beings.- The secondary runes are set ones that can't be changed and the primary is the one that sets the characteristic the array will alter. Moreover, two runes can be linked as the primary rune, but anymore than that and it fails, which he supposes is where the more complicated arrays come in. Also, just because those particular runes are set ones for this kind of array, it doesn't mean that they can't act as primaries too.

And all of that was just from two different arrays that have the same structure. He has three more structures to go through. And then he has to experiment with items with different sizes, forms, compositions...

(This is not a bear, it's a damn whale.)

He kind of wants to scream but, hey, he still has all his fingers and the house is not only standing but hasn't been damaged at all. Only a full stack of papers has been sacrificed to the cause. Yay for him.

"Ah, father, you man of little faith," he mutters, slouching on his seat and closing his eyes tiredly.

There's no way he can-

Really loud rock music blares suddenly from the laptop's speakers, startling Stiles into almost falling from his chair. He looks at Peter, who looks as surprised as Stiles and is also trying to lower down the volume as fast as he can.

" _What the hell, Peter_ ," Stiles gasps, one hand still over his thundering heart and the other grasping at the chair in a trembling iron fist.

"I was trying to put the soundtrack to your little moment there, but this is _not_ what I expected," the man explains perplexed. "I mean, the song _is_ called Crushing Defeat, but I wouldn't say a crushing defeat sounds like that. Not that I would know, but." And then the man has the gall to shrug nonchalantly before continuing speaking. "I should have definitely gone for my first option."

And he hits play.

_Maybe I'm foolish_

_Maybe I'm blind_

_Thinking I can see through this_

_And see what's behind_

_Got no way to prove it_

_So maybe I'm blind_

_But I'm only human after all_

_I'm only human after all_

And he stops the music right there.

Stiles, whose face had gone from startled to unimpressed in the blink of an eye, goes right into the evil eye territory equally fast.

"Remind me again who's been dead before?" Stiles says, his voice saccharine sweet.

"Sure! Anything for you, sweetheart," Peter answers, equally sweet. "I'll remind you anytime you want that not even Death could win against me. Anything to inspire you when you're feeling low."

And he turns back with a self-satisfied smirk to continue whatever he was doing before.

That.

Smarmy.

Bastard.

Stiles will show him a _crushing defeat_.

(Also, just for that, he's hoarding all the cookies, dammit.)

\---

It has somehow turned into a contest.

It's way past 4 a.m. and neither of them is bowing out. Stiles has gone through three more structures, gained more knowledge and even more rules. Peter has at least filled ten pages of that journal of his and Stiles has caught him covertly eyeing the coffee cupboard more than once. At this rate, John Stilinski will arrive to see them either conked out over their respective works or stubbornly resisting but about to pass out.

At this point Stiles wishes his dad would appear so he could order him to bed and he'd have the excuse to bow out, but he'd rather face another run around the pool with _all_ the alphas chasing after him than admit to that.

He eyes the cookie plate and mourns its empty state. Then, with a sigh, he turns his attention back the last structure that he has. So far he has confirmed a lot of the things that he already suspected. The more complicated an array gets, the more things you're trying to change on an object... or the more complicated the object's composition or the being you're placing it on is. But so far Stiles has gathered that if you place an array on a living being, you better brace yourself because it's so complicated that it has disastrous effects more often than not. Which is no good... unless you're banking on it going wrong to get out of a pinch. Stiles certainly wouldn't mind making an alpha go boom with failed runework, that's for sure.

Well, in any case he now has an idea of how the arrays are expanded and of how to link different arrays to cover the more irregular objects or to make domino effects. Of course, he just has the theory and he'll have to experiment a lot but it's something that's not a "crushing defeat". 

He just wants to die.

Stiles barely refrains from hitting his head repeatedly against the table to wake himself up forcefully but only because he still has some dignity left. He looks at the stress ball that he got out to fidget with by hour... whichever it was, he's lost count. It used to belong to Scott, from when he hurt his hand and he needed to strengthen his muscles. It's fuchsia with green polka dots all over it and it couldn't be uglier even if it tried, so it wouldn't be a big loss if Stiles accidentally murders it.

The material is polyurethane, if he's not wrong. The thought of getting up to check its mass on the laptop is too much to bear, so Stiles uses his phone to search for it. When he finally has it, he muses over what he needs to change on it to make it bounce. Elasticity, for one, of course. Resistance maybe? And what else to generate the kinetic energy he needs? How much does he need to add or subtract to its original characteristics to get what he wants?

It takes a while, but he decides what structure to use and the runes that form part of it in the end. Then he calculates the size it should have and, after fretting over it for a bit, he decides that you only live once is the attitude to have and starts writing it directly on the ball. After a moment he realizes that pencil is not the way to go and changes to a sharpie. Either the ball is really old or the sharpie is too pointed, but instead of just writing on its surface, he's partially etching the array. He bites his lip but decides to go on. Then he activates it.

Something catches his attention at the edge of his vision and he turns to find Peter about to fall asleep. Stiles grins triumphantly and picks up his phone to get the visual evidence to lord his victory over the man when he wakes up later. Because he's going to sleep once he has the picture, dammit, he's dying.

Right as he's snapping the picture, the stress ball rolls over the edge and falls to the tiled floor before he can catch it...

... then it ricochets silently but with deadly speed towards the ceiling, where it rebounds again, gaining even more speed than it already had.

"Oh, fuck," Stiles whispers wide-eyed. "Peter!" he screams right before it hits the man's head, sending him sprawling to the floor. "Oh, fuck!"

"What the-!" Peter groans, somehow managing to look both like a spooked kitten and as if a train has just rolled over him at the same time.

"Down!" Stiles warns him again as it comes back like a tiny missile. Peter, the idiot, tries to grab it as it passes by. "NO!" he shouts but to no avail.

Peter gets thrown forward and out of the kitchen, where he proceeds to crash onto the living room's lamp before he can finally stop the momentum, successfully managing to not make another victim out of the TV. The ball continues bouncing and gaining even more speed.

"Oh, fuck," Stiles whines.

\---

When the sheriff comes back home, he's greeted by a very odd sight. There's a trash bag full of things in a corner and several items, which includes two lamps, several pictures and a small side table, are missing. There are a lot of round marks over several pieces of furniture, the walls and the ceiling, and quite a few of those round marks look carved in and scorched. From where he is, he can see that the glass from two of the kitchen cupboards is gone and that there are two perfect holes on the dishwasher's door. There's a plant without its pot just sitting there on the living room's table and the missing pot is right at the center of the same table, downturned. Last but not least, Peter Hale and Stiles are completely out, one over the other, on the couch, dark bags scarily prominent under their eyes.

John blinks. And then he blinks even more.

"Well, the house is still standing," he mutters as he reaches for the pot to take the plant off of the table, because he has to start somewhere to fix the mess, after all, and this is really the only thing he can do right now. The rest he'll take care of after he wakes up.

"NO!!!!" both Stiles and Peter shout, snapping awake and bolting, just as he lifts the pot from the table.

\---

The plant is still on the living room table but the pot holding the ewok - _what, it's a small and harmless looking (fur)ball that's really dangerous when provoked, dad, where's the lie?_ \- is in the toilet, with the door closed for good measure.

(There's another hole in the dishwasher's door and they've lost the two vases that had survived the first assault. Only Peter's speed saved the laptop and it was only by a hair's breadth.)

(Stiles is secretly happy that the TV and the recorder haven't been casualties. He had to pull a The Bodyguard™ move and there's a round shaped bruise already showing on his stomach, but it was well worth it. He'd die if he missed yesterday's episode of La Dulce Impostora.) 

(Not that he'll say _that_ aloud, of course.)

It's mid-afternoon and they're having breakfast and not feeling any shame about it. Stiles feels like a limp noodle and is ravenous. He has probably already eaten his weight in pancakes with an obscene amount of syrup, but he has no intention of stopping any time soon.

He looks at Peter's plate covetuously and the man's lips twitch, but he makes an offering gesture (sassy and a little mocking, but still offering) instead of lording his remaining pancake over Stiles. It takes a lot to not descend over it like a rabid beast, and even more to rise from his seat and make more instead. He even shares them with his dad and Peter, someone should give him medal for the feat.

Just as he's taking the first bite, the cupboard's door, which was barely hanging from its hinges, makes a piteous sound and falls first to the counter and then to the ground, dragging a plate to it's ultimate demise with it. The lack of door reveals that almost all the mugs inside said cupboard have been smashed to smithereens at some point.

"So," his dad says, looking caught between horrified amusement and resignation.

"You said I'd be grounded if the house wasn't standing," Stiles points out, mouth full and all.

Peter snorts and takes a sip of his coffee. Unlike Stiles and John, the bastard doesn't look tired at all. He's sitting on the chair as if it's his throne. Stiles is a petty creature and he really wants to call bullshit because he knows that's the man's third cup of coffee, so he can't be feeling as good as he's making it look. The need to shoot a dirty look at him for the unfairness of it is almost overwhelming.

"I said I'd definitely ground you if it wasn't standing, not that I wouldn't ground you for any other damaged property."

"What- You- I claim false advertising!" Stiles gasps with a hand over his heart.

"Terribly sorry about that," John deadpans. "I'm sure I have some complaint forms somewhere. I'll make sure your reclamation reaches the proper authorities." He takes a long swallow of coffee and sighs contentedly. "Which would be me, so reclamation dismissed."

"Abuse! I claim abuse! No, don't hand me another imaginary reclamation form!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yo hablo español = I speak Spanish.  
> La Dulce Impostora = The Sweet Impostor.
> 
> Comments, please?

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Please review :) and let me know what you think.


End file.
